London One North Chingford 22 Sudbury 8 Sudbury travelled to East London to third-placed Chingford on Saturday and despite a spirited performance lost a close game.

East Anglian Daily Times: Chris Lewis kicked a penalty for SudburyChris Lewis kicked a penalty for Sudbury

Sudbury kicked off with the chill breeze, immediately took play into the Chingford half and within three minutes were awarded a penalty for offside.

Chris Lewis made sure of the kick to give Sudbury a three point lead.

The home side had the best of the early set pieces and after ten minutes, scored, after a scrum and line-out in the twenty two and then drove over from close range.

Sudbury put themselves under pressure from the restart by not kicking the required ten metres.

And from the resulting scrum a skilful move passing the ball wide, and then back across the park, re-cycling the ball to stretch the Sudbury defence, saw Chingord score again.

Both sides were being punished by referee for straying offside but were playing some attractive rugby in the heavy conditions, Chingford were having the best of the play with some crisp passing and sharper tackling but Sudbury were still competing well. Chingford added a third try with a good run down the wing and got their only conversion of the day just before half-time.

The second half saw no slowing of the pace of the game and Chingford secured the bonus point after seven minutes of play with another well-worked move in the cold and muddy conditions.

Sudbury kept plugging away but the home side retained the edge until the last quarter of the game when Johnny Taylor broke through with a good break to score wide on the left.

The last ten minutes saw both teams pick up the pace but the game was littered with knock-ons and offside decisions and although Sudbury retained field position they were unable to improve their points tally.

Once again a good determined effort but unfortunately not a win.

The result sees Sudbury remain in trouble at the bottom of the table, with 14 points from 18 games. Only Barking, with 13 points, are keeping them off the bottom.

This weekend the west Suffolk side host Ruislip, who sit in eighth place in the league. Sudbury simply have to turn their good play into wins and string some results together if they are to have any hope of survival.