Hendon sealed a comfortable 35-7 victory over Luton in their second run out since returning to competitive action.
Luton surprised their visitors with an early try as their forwards mauled and crashed through the Hendon defence to score under the posts for an easy conversion and seven points on the board.
Was this a wake up call and could Hendon respond positively?
The answer came after 20 minutes as captain Cian Hynes rallied his troops. The equalising try came off the training park as a forward move to the Luton 22 was finished off by the backline, with new recruit Dragos Ciocan scoring a Hynes converted try 7-7.
Before the first period ended Hendon had taken full control and scored twice from forward Harrison Teague, another new recruit, and Chris Kiyingi – both converted by Hynes for a 7-21 turn around score.
Early in the second-half and Hendon were in full flight with a complete team performance to keep the well drilled Luton attack from further scoring. The Hendon forwards took possession to set up their backrow and backline players to finish off with two further tries by another new recruit in Marius Von Moltke and JT Moncher on the wing, both converted by Hynes.
It was a welcome return in the second row for Michael Culhane supported by TJ O’Sullivan. Both were impressive, winning the majority of Line outs, with Andres Yousif-Romero impressing with his field play.
Hendon head coach Phil Smith said: "The new recruits were impressive and fitted in well with the team giving me a variety of options for our first league match this Saturday in London 3 North West against Finchley."
Hendon will take on Finchley at Copthall Playing Fields on Saturday at 3pm.
They'll be hoping to build on their pre-season friendlies that have proved to be a success.
For more information on joining the club or trying out at a training session, visit https://www.hendonrugby.com/
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