Tight-five selection worries for coach Box

A FRONT-ROW crisis has caused major headaches at the Guernsey Rugby Club this week ahead of their trip to Romsey tomorrow. Normal practice for coach Rob Box, captain Carl Johnson and the rest of the management team is to select their weekend side after training on Tuesday.

However, due to injuries and unavailability, that meeting had to be delayed because of potential problems in the tight five with the final selection set to take place after last evening's session.

'Hopefully, two out of the three will play. It is one of the big areas of improvement we have made recently.'

The skipper admitted that there were also question marks over who would play in the second row which needed resolving for what is an important game even at this early stage in their London Four South-West campaign.

'But really this is a game we have to win if we want to do well in the league because they appear to be one of the lower teams.'

However, Johnson still expects Romsey to provide a sterner test than Old Amplefordians did on the opening day of the season two weeks ago.

The Sarnians won that fixture 46-8 while on the same afternoon Romsey suffered a 37-10 defeat to Old Reigatians.

But past fixtures in Hampshire One between these two sides were fairly even.

'We have not got the greatest record against Romsey,' Johnson said.

'We won one and lost one against them the last time although if I remember rightly, we had to replay one of those games because we ran out of front rowers.

'Both games were quite close, but we feel that we are a lot better now than we were then.

'They played a quite fast loose-forward type of style and they will be hard and well-drilled,' the captain added.