Given Beverley RUFC dismal record on past visits to Scatcherd Lane and with two heavy defeats behind them Beverley would have feared the worst here.
And for half the match their fears would have been justified. In the end Morley did run away with it but Beverley made a good fist of it after the break and in terms of second half scoring had outscored Morley by 14-0 until ten minutes from time.
For twenty minutes after halftime they played their best rugby of the season such that you could almost feel the glimmer of a new dawn breaking after a wretched few weeks.
Beverley got off to the worst possible start. They dropped the ball from the kickoff immediately conceding possession and after a brief flurry down the right Morley wing Andy Funnell went over for the opening try. It was quickly apparent that the muscular home pack was going to take some holding and six minutes later they drove over from a five metre scrum with number eight Will Smith getting the touchdown.
Eight minutes gone and Beverley were already twelve points behind and struggling to get out of their own 22 let alone make inroads into Morley territory. Morley are a well organised side with a pacy backline and come the end of the season will very likely be among the league’s front runners. Very soon they were adding points at an average of one a minute. Clearly it was going to be a long hard afternoon for Beverley who looked very lightweight in comparison.
Wing Scott Glynn, full back Karl Bradshaw, and centre Richard Knowles all added tries and with a penalty and four conversions by Mark Chester Morley had moved to 36-0 by halftime. Beverley had hardly had a sniff of the play and had never looked remotely like getting anywhere near the home line.
For all that, the forwards were giving it everything and tackling heroically. Phil Duboulay and Andy Rowbotham were looking comfortable at halfback albeit they were struggling to make anything of scant possession. Beverley’s problems lay largely in midfield and out wide where Morley invariably had space and men over whenever they ran the ball. Beverley’s cause did not seem to be helped by an endless stream of substitutions with players constantly coming and going throughout. The withdrawing of Jack Bunn and Lewis Starbuck, their key lineout man, for spells during the match seemed particularly mystifying.
Be that as it may, for twenty minutes after the break Beverley gave us something to cheer about. Whether it was that Morley had eased off or whether it was entirely Beverley raising their game it was difficult to say. But Beverley came out fighting and within four minutes had not only penetrated the home 22 for the first time but had at last scored their first try of the season. The pack had worked its way upfield with a series of pick and drives and when the ball was moved right Sam Roe slid through to the posts for a well worked try which Duboulay converted.
Beverley suddenly looked the more dangerous side and they added to their score with another converted Roe try after Morley made a mess of a quickly taken throw-in. Within minutes Roe almost had a third when he burst through the middle only to be tackled just short of the line. After what had gone before it was all wonderful to behold for Beverley. Sadly it did not quite last. In the last ten minutes Morley came back strongly and added three more converted tries; the pack going over following a five metre scrum, Furnell then running in his second, and at the death the best try of the match scored by substitute Ed Kelly.
It was another heavy defeat for Beverley but all in all the day might have been a lot worse and for twenty minutes at least they gave grounds for hope that the season might soon take a turn for the better.
Final Score: Morley 57 Beverley RUFC 14 | Reported by John Nursey
