Slemen: Give the ball to Ollie (From Richmond and Twickenham Times)

Slemen: Give the ball to Ollie

10:00am Friday 7th October 2011 in Esher By Stuart Amos

Captain David Slemen reckons Harlequins loan stars Ollie Lindsay-Hague and Charlie Walker have the fire power to secure a first Championship win of the season for Esher.

Director of rugby Mike Schmid’s men lost 37-3 at Molesey Road on Friday night to make it five straight league defeats since the start of the campaign.

Lindsay-Hague and Walker were significant threats with ball in hand against the Exiles, but Esher’s hard pushed forwards were unable to secure enough ball to exploit their potential.

And Slemen believes addressing that is one of the priorities if his men are to get their season up and running with a win at Rotherham this week.

“We’ve got 17 players out at the moment and for a squad that is semi-professional like ours, it is very hard to play through that,” he says.

“There are some positives, because some players who weren’t first choice at the start of the season, have stepped up and proved they can play at this level.

“There are not many outside backs better than Ollie and Charlie in this league, if we can get them the ball.

“We have to do that more often because we don’t want to be defending all day.”

Esher conceded two tries from penalty kicks that struck the woodwork on Friday, with Seb Jewell – who scored a double against his former club – profiting directly from one and Welsh notching a penalty try, after the hosts knocked on, from the other.

“When things aren’t going well those 50-50 things tend to go against you. We went in to half-time 23-3 down when it should have been something like 7-3. It knocked the stuffing out of us,” Slemen adds.

Centre Slemen has handed Schmid a boost with news he is eyeing a comeback from a back injury in three weeks time, but it is Saturday’s trip to south Yorkshire that is highest on the agenda.

“This is a two tier league, with the six at the top and six at the bottom competing with each other. Rotherham are in the bottom six with us,” he says.

“If we can beat them, the momentum swings our way and an away win would be a good way to get that started.

“We’ve done well there before.”