Record win for Morpeth rugby

It was perhaps an early indicator of how the game would pan out as sides assessed the excellent playing surface prepared by John Dungait and his team. The visitors ambled tentatively from the changing rooms whereas the home side, led by captain Jack Elliott, jogged purposefully to the top end of the pitch to face the kick off.

Immediately Morpeth were on the offensive, with good ball retention. After a fine run from Kieran Smith and excellent recycling, Tony Moody crashed over for the first score after three minutes. 5-0.

Then three minutes later after a Manley break, Alex Thompson crashed over with Callum Burgess converting. 12-0. A few minutes later, after excellent work from Ian Grieve, left wing James Turner scored with Burgess again converting for 19-0.

To their credit the visitors managed to keep Morpeth in their own half for the next 15 minutes but with a malfunctioning lineout and intense pressure from the home side in the scrum, they were unable to penetrate the excellent home defence. Then after a brilliant break by Ollie Dynan, supported by Thompson, Simon Manley scored, and Burgess converted, making it 26-0.

A few minutes later the home side scored a very good team try with forwards and backs combining and Burgess going over. The same player scored again two minutes later, then converting to make score 38-0. Danny Dowd came on for Manley and moved onto the wing with Turner moving to centre. Minutes later another excellent team try finished by Thompson with Burgess again successful with the conversion saw Morpeth in complete control at 45-0 at the break.

Prop Theo Gavaghan replaced Hus Yilmaz at half time, (although he returned later in the half to replace Moody). Shortly after Ben Hornby left the field and was replaced by Craig Donnelly who moved onto the left wing, with Elliott moving to fly half and Dowd to scrum half.

The changes did little to stem the tide for the visitors who although overpowered stayed in the fight with fullback Laycock was always competitive.

Further tries were scored by Ollie Dynan (2), Keiran Smith (3) Donnelly (2) Theo Gavaghan, Turner and Elliott. Two of these tries particularly stood out with Dynan making a break on halfway, who spotted Smith wide on the right wing, placing a brilliant kick off the outside of his right foot for the winger to collect and score! The other was Donnelly, tackling his opposite number, getting to his feet, stealing the ball and running 35m to score.

This was a very good performance by the home side, who played very attractive 15 man rugby and didn't allow their performance to slip. They ran in 17 tries with 13 Burgess conversions.

On Saturday, league leaders Morpeth, who are two points clear of Penrith at the top of the North 2 table, are home to bottom of the table Carlisle.