Henley 10 Coventry 18 by John Wilkinson.

Coventry's’ Mr Dependable, Cliffie Hodgson, kicked his side to their sixth away win of the season as they resumed their National League One campaign in a somewhat unconvincing manner.

The rust from a three-week break was in evidence as Cov failed to make the most of their chances in the opening half hour and they then had to survive a rocky middle period as Henley upped their game.

But while the tries wouldn’t come, the pressure produced a string of penalties and Hodgson stepped up to the mark to convert six of them to secure a satisfying victory which neither of the top two sides in the division, Doncaster and Rosslyn Park, had managed on their earlier visits to Dry Leas.

On balance, it was the right outcome in a stop-start game punctuated by the whistle of referee Tom Davis, who awarded no less 19 penalties across the 80 minutes – 15 of them against the home side – and three yellow cards.

Both sides made too many unforced errors on a soft surface, Cov in particular trying to force the game too early when a bit more control might have opened up the home defence, but when things did start to get tough for them, they dug in to grind out a result which would, in all probability, have eluded them a season ago.

Cov made an excellent start, dominating the first few scrums and upsetting Henley’s line-out, but with a Brett Daynes score ruled out for a double movement and Mark Kohler denied by a forward pass, all they had to show for a first quarter played entirely in the Henley half were two Hodgson penalties.

A yellow card for Henley’s former Cov prop Dai Maddocks led to a third Hodgson penalty after 23 minutes, but the numerical advantage lasted just three minutes before Danny Wright was also sent to the sin bin.

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