BURY...10

DIDSBURY TOC H...44

DESPITE predictions of the weathermen, Saturday was a bright day but a bitingly cold wind chilled the good turnout of spectators.

Toc H opened their account after two minutes when the Bury tight head was penalised for offside.

They incresed their margin when Bury kicked the ball dead and conceded a five metre scrum, the visitors took the blind side option and scored an unconverted try.

Only a minute later Bury conceded a further converted penalty when naively a fly hack upfield was picked up by a player in an offside position.

The home side, now 11 points to the bad, with only 10 minutes elapsed, finally woke up.

A good build-up following some fine rucking, saw the stand-off recognising an overlap on the left flank, took the opportunity and hooker Kelly crossed the line for an unconverted try.

What was to follow was some of the most inept play seen this season.

After a fine diagonal kick into the opposition 22 and awarded the lineout following pressure from Smithson and Fielding, Bury proceeded to lose the lineout.

The visitors were penalised for infringement, however, and flank forward Robinson put the resulting penalty into touch still only a few metres from the try-line.

A combination of poor throw-ins and lack of understanding between the forwards saw Bury concede five consecutive lines, along with 80 metres of distance to finish up defending their own try-line.

Inevitably, the visitors' next try was to come from a line-out easily converted by their full-back.

Toc H concluded their scoring for the first period with a converted try in the 35th minute of the half.

What was apparent to the older, and I would suggest, knowledgeable past first team players and captains, was the configuration of the Bury team.

By consensus it is hard to justify playing a second row forward at inside centre, a talented number eight forward in the second row and Bury's most versatile forward being able to play any position in the three-quarter line languishing in the back row.

It has to be said that these observations were made prior to kick-off, not with the advantage of hindsight.

Captain Westwood had obviously given the hard word during the interval and for the first 10 minutes after the resumption Bury finally started to play some constructive rugby.

This resulted in a try in the 14th minute for scrum-half Darryl Stott which went unconverted.

The resurgence was, however, short-lived, the homs side now having closed the margin to only 15 points seemed to lose heart, this bolstered the aspirations of Toc H and they were to add converted tries in the 17th, 25th and 38th minutes converting two of these.

The visitors deserved their victory but on a man-for-man basis there was little to choose between either side but Bury did not play to their strengths.

Coach John Hargreaves returns from holiday this week and will no doubt reinforce this simple and enforceable tactical game plan.

TEAM: Westwood, Kelly, Marshall, Smithson, Kennedy, Robinson, McDermott, Elliott, Laughton, Chester, Fielding, Stott, Kyle, Lindsey-Smith, McDougall.

Tomorrow sees Bury face stern opposition in their first league match against Eccles for two seasons.

Kick-off 2.30pm at the Radcliffe Road ground.