This was your classic game of two halves at Leicester Road with Old Albanians hanging on for a 6 point victory having been 27 – 7 up at the break.

It was a bright and still afternoon at Leicester Road, some of the best conditions seen in a game for a long side, with a new Hinckley side taking to the field with league debuts for Adam Groocock, Henry Joule, Kit Smith and Chris Arnold, with Josh Smith captaining the side for the first time in his 151st appearance for the club.

OA’s got the first points with a penalty soon after the kick off from a Smith high tackle, and soon after this was followed by the visiting full back Alex Ricci scored a superb individual try to give OA’s a 10 point lead.

This was a hugely frustrating try to concede as it again came from a Hinckley error like had been seen 2 weeks ago since Barnes, and with set piece dominance stating to build, the home fly half Rory Vowles chipped and collecting himself to bring the score back to 10 – 7.

What was to come next however was extremely disappointing from the home faithful, with OA’s scoring 3 tries in a blink of the eye with Ricci the full back, who all teams will now be on notice about a key figure in giving the visitors a 27 – 7 half time lead.

The second half however felt like the first time this season where Hinckley really took control of the game, despite the score line, and 15 minutes of dominance paid off with Andrew Weaver scoring to bring the gap back to 13 points after a series of lineout drives and pick and gos.

The fight back was very much on when Joe Wilson went underneath the posts with 11 minutes to go to leave the score at 27 – 21 but an opportunistic try from Andrew Nurse meant it looked like the away side would be home and dry with 8 minutes to go.

However Hinckley never know when to lie down, and Ben Pointon’s score with 5 minutes left meant that Hinckley had an opportunity to go for the win, and when the visitors lost 2 men to the bin in quick succession, it was felt the game must be there for the taking, especially as a rolling maul was moving towards the line, but a knock on the last moment meant the home side had to settle for two points, which was a deserved return for their second half efforts.