Southern Counties North: Slough Rugby Club were not at the races in defeat to Reading

A second-half try from Aman Grewal was all the visitors managed in West Berkshire, and Miles believes Slough went into the match a little too confident following their derby win against Marlow the week before.

He told the Observer: “We just didn’t turn up at all and our mindset was completely wrong. Looking at past results, we probably just thought we could win.

“To be fair to Reading, they played with the same gameplan to us but executed it perfectly on the day.

“We were very off the pace and I don’t think we touched the ball at all for the first 30 minutes.

“We conditions didn’t help but they were the same for both sides so we can’t blame it on that.

“We like to spread the ball out wide and use our pace in the backs, but the wet and windy conditions made it more difficult.

“We were better in the second half and showed heart and passion to keep it to one try apiece, but the first half was completely different.”

Miles continued: “Our slow starts is something we need to sort out and pretty quickly.

“We can’t keep on giving teams a head start in this league because they’ll punish you.”

The defeat leaves Slough in seventh position in Southern Counties North ahead of a visit to Tamblyn Fields from Reading Abbey on Saturday 20th October (3pm).

The Greenies turn their attention to the Southern Counties Cup and an away tie at Amersham & Chiltern from London One North this Saturday (3pm).

Miles said: “We have a few players missing this week so it’ll be a tough one. It’ll be a bit of a re-shuffle because we have six or seven first team players missing.

“We will go there in hope, give them a good show and try to come away with an upset.

“The league is definitely our main priority this season. That’s not to say we wouldn’t love a cup run but we want to focus on the league and anything that does happen in the cups is a bonus.”

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