MALTON ON FIRE!

James Knock

The alternative attractions of the gods at Twickenham( row 153 seat 90,binoculars at the ready) or the armchair at home for Ireland v All Blacks ensured an average attendance at the Gannock for the visit of Durham City notable for the appearance as touch judge of their president/chairman/bar manager etc, a man of many talents.

The 120 or so attendees witnessed Malton hitting 52 points for the second time this season, and the continuation of the form they displayed in the second half at Brods two weeks ago.

Durham opened proceedings briskly moving the Malton pack round the pitch, retaining possession and passing adroitly to find their pacemen out wide. Their first try came when Malton’s 13 broke the defensive line and created the gap for Durham to exploit and move rapidly to Malton’s 10 metre zone and two phases later they crossed the limewash for 5 points only.

Malton were slowly getting into their stride and Will Hughes made several surges with his skipper in tow into the Durham 20 metre area but the finishing was lacking and the first 15 minutes belonged to Durham.

On 20 minutes Malton at last had territory and Foan went over for 5 points only.

Four minutes later Tenge made good ground on his wing, passed inside and with the ball travelling through several pairs of hands a break by Angus put Tweddell through for a well worked unconverted try.

Durham replied immediately with a penalty and the 10-8 score reflected the game so far.

Malton gathered themselves together and now started to play clever rugby with crisp short passing and good ball retention laying the ball back perfectly when tackled for the backs to exploit and a clever pass missing a man by Angus put Poole over for a self converted try in the 35th minute.

A 17-8 lead at half time should have been more but for a hint of selfishness at times which the coach must have mentioned since the second half became a copybook display by the 17 players used.

Malton opened the second half with a complete reversal of the opening 20 minutes pressuring Durham and scoring 21 points before The visitors paid a rare visit to the Malton end on 62 minutes. The scores came on 52,54 and 60 minutes through Foan Head, and Fothergill.

The next 10 minutes belonged to the brothers Hughes with Ted following Will round the park giving and receiving passes to and from each other resulting in Will deservedly crashing over on 68 minutes for a 7 pointer, wth Fothergill completing his brace duly converted by the ever accurate Poole to complete Malton’s scoring.

A feature of the second half was the five kick offs received by Malton, mostly dealt with in style with Triffitt catching, evading tackles and feeding Hughes on the charge to set up ball well outside the 20 metre zone for the half backs to exploit instead of the static catch, ruck,and box kick which is the norm in the modern game.

Credit to Durham who did not shoulder arms but carried on playing rugby to the end and scored 5 points to close proceedings.

Next week a trip to Consett and with only 5 points separating Malton’s 7th place in the league and 11 th place a healthy result is needed to put the squad in good heart for the 3 games before the halfway mark on December 11th, one of those 3 games being the league leaders.

Malton:  Ali Fothergill,  Jacob Tweddell,  Will Bell,  Tom Foan,  Ben Tenge,  Shane Poole,  Paul Angus,  Nick Salisbury,  Bailey Lamb,  Pete Hopkins,  Will Hughes,  Ted Hughes,  Jacob Head,  Tom Lowry,  Sam Triffitt (c).

Subs:  Tom Smith,  Tomas Barker,  (both used),
             Rob Armitage,  (not used).

Scorers:   Foan      2 tries
               Tweddell    1 try
               Poole     1 try, 6 cons
               Fothergill  2 tries

               Head  1 try

               W. Hughes  1 try