Highams club looking for wins to beat drop

Ilford Recorder: Peter O'Brien tries to bring the ball forward for Romford & Gidea Park against Woodford (pic: DNR Glover)Peter O'Brien tries to bring the ball forward for Romford & Gidea Park against Woodford (pic: DNR Glover) (Image: Archant)

Woodford coach Andy Murphy is hopeful his side can compete with Barking on Saturday (March 7), if only in patches.

The Highams club are 17-points adrift at the bottom of the London One North league and host fifth-placed Barking.

Ilford Recorder: Woodford in action against Romford (pic: DNR Glover)Woodford in action against Romford (pic: DNR Glover) (Image: Archant)

Murphy believes Woodford have played well in parts against every side in the league and feels that will be the case again this weekend.

“We’ve done well for periods of time against everybody. Even against (league leaders) Colchester, we had a period of about 20 minutes where we played really good rugby,” said Murphy.

“We played well for 20 minutes but we were then knackered with 20 minutes to go. It shows our conditioning is not where it should be.”

In their last match, Woodford lost 43-5 away to Romford & Gidea Park and Murphy has pinpointed areas of improvement for their match with Barking.

“I want the scrum to go well. We’ve got two relatively young props so if we can compete in the front row we’ll be doing well,” he added.

“The lineout will hopefully be strong. I want us to front up in defence as our first-up tackles against Romford were poor.

“We’ll give the boys some targets individually, other than the scoreline, to work on.”