University of Durham 18- 16 Northumbria University 2nds

Adam Houston reports from Maiden Castle

Northumbria University 2nds travelled to Durham hoping to kick start their BUCS North Title aspirations after tasting a heavy defeat away to Leeds TASC last week. Durham got off to winning ways against Northumbria’s bitter rivals Newcastle so came in to the game in good spirit.

Indiscipline and too many errors was the early story of the half for both sides before Durham took advantage of a lapse in concentration.

Full Back James Alderson scoring 17 minutes in after some neat approach play. A spirited Northumbria side led by some crunching defence led in no small part by skipper Luke Banham responded quickly and Lewis Marston scored the first of his hat trick on the day when impressive play down the short side say Adam Jones’ miss pass set the winger free to cross untouched. The difficult extras from out wide proving to be too much for Pete Taylor to convert.

Again indiscipline proved to be Northumbria’s downfall when after gifting Durham back to back penalties, a well executed backs move allowed Paul Dodsworth to fine Alderson who crossed for his second. The visitors hit back right on the stroke of half time when Jones again found Marston with a long pass to score an almost identical try to his first, again the extras proving too difficult for Taylor who came agonisingly close.

The second period started much the same as the first with Northumbria’s defence giving away careless penalties before Durham capitalised on this through Martin Hall who powered his way over. This fired up the visitors whose bruising defence forced error after error and some fine interplay between Matt Lumb & Pete Taylor set a solid platform for a sweeping movement from left to right finished off by Iain Murray. Matt Lumb again linked up well, this time finding Lewis Marston on his inside to race clear for his hat trick score to put the visitors 2 points ahead with less than 10 mins to play.

A controversial decision to wipe the tackle count after Durham recovered their own kick on the last, after no interference from Northumbria at all gifted the hosts another set of 6 deep in opposition territory. From the resulting set, Will Allsopp crossed to put them ahead by 2 points, and clinching the win for the boys in purple.

UNIVERSITY of DURHAM:

1. James Alderson
2. Tom Stanton
3. Dave Stewart
4. Paul Synesiou
5. George Simkin
6. Martin Hall
7. Alex Bishop
8. Felix Newman
9. Jonathon Stansmith
10. Paul Dodsworth
11. Jamie Everett
12. Henry Simkin
13. Will Alsopp

SUBS (all used):

NORTHUMBRIA UNIVERSITY:

1. Simon Baker,
2. Iain Murray,
3. John Burns,
4. Luke Banham
5. Lewis Marston,
6. Adam Jones,
7. Joe Jackson,
8. Jaskaran Deu,
9. Louie Moore,
10. Gareth Davies,
11. Neil Eyes,
12. Shaun Emmett
13. Pete Taylor,

SUBS (all used):

Scorers:

Northumbria: T: Marston (23, 40, 72) , Murray (56)

G: Taylor (0/4)

Man of the Match:

Durham: Dave Stewart Northumbria: Gareth Davies

Half Time: 10 - 8

Ref: Norman Jevons