Hunt praises hard-working Chiefs
By Harry Scott-Munro
9/2/21
Exeter Chiefs second-row McKinley Hunt admitted she was thrilled to secure a “messy” win over Allianz Premier 15s table-toppers Harlequins, as she and her team-mates backed up their victory over Saracens with another prized scalp at Sandy Park.
An early try from Hunt herself, converted by Gabby Cantorna, may have been Exeter’s only score throughout the 70 minutes, but it proved to be enough to secure a cagey 7-6 success.
“We’re really happy with that,” Hunt said at full-time. “Sometimes you have messy wins and that was definitely one of them. That said, we came together as a team and it’s just great to show what we’re building here at Chiefs and prove that we’re up there with those top teams.”
Hunt’s early score was her fourth of the season, after a series of strong initial busts from her pack. Afterwards, the Canadian international was complimentary of their efforts, highlighting the squad effort that goes into crossing the try-line.
“It was great. A lot of my team-mates had worked hard for me to get over the line and that was really the cherry on top of that.”
Since the start of the season, Hunt has formed a formidable second-row partnership with Poppy Leitch - and the continuity that has come from this has proved invaluable to the Chiefs, with their pack arguably one of the strongest in the league.
“It’s been great playing with Poppy,” she continued. “You can see that she’s a menace out there and it’s a lot of fun, you can hear her all the time. As a second-row you really want to have that strong partnership. We are the engine room, so having that continuity from game to game is awesome.”
In a physical encounter, defence dominated, with the work that Chiefs have done in training with coaches Susie Appleby and Amy Garnett paving the way for another tremendous defensive performance.
“Defence is at the heart of winning a game, so we’ve really been putting in a lot of work every day at training,” added Hunt. “We’ve been working on our double shots and working on our technique behind our tackles and you can see, we’re all really supporting each other out there. You don’t really have a lot of one-off tackles, so it’s great to see that our hard work is coming to fruition.”
This weekend will see the Chiefs head back on the road, as they look to do the double over Jo Yapp’s Worcester Warriors.
Hunt knows that Chiefs will now have a target on their backs after their last two performances, so is expecting a tough challenge at Sixways.
“We had a tough game against them back in the fall, so we know they’re going to be gunning for us. It’s just trying to put in that work this week and make sure we’re ready for the weekend.”