Didsbury Toc H 32 – 34 Aspatria

The pitch was in a decent condition, thanks to the Didsbury ground staff of Mike Harrison, Ian Massingham and Perkins Joseph who worked tirelessly to prepare the ground after the damage caused by the flood water.

Aspatria, making their first visit to Didsbury after plummeting down the league structure, were second best in all areas in the opening 20 minutes. With Toc H blasting holes through the visitors defence, Didsbury had a good platform to attack from. Evergreen centre Dylan Williams hit the line hard, and the line hit back, but he cleverly off loaded to Aidan Murphy who skipped past the fullback to touch down under the posts. Sean Bishop, who’s deadeye kicking has been a feature this season, slotted the conversion. The pressure on Aspatria was unrelenting, and from a defensive lineout for the hosts James Eames pressurised the scrum half. The ball came loose and Shaun Walker skillfully gathered and pounced over the tryline. Bishop added the conversion and Didsbury led 14-0. More pressure presented Bishop with a penalty, which again sailed over to stretch the lead further to 17-0. At this point Aspatria started to come into the game, and were rewarded with the stand-off stepping inside a tackle to score by the posts. The conversion was good and Aspatria were on the board 17-7. Bishop converted his second penalty, which was cancelled out by an Aspatria effort making the score 20-10 at the interval.

Aspatria increased their intensity from the restart, and managed to take the lead 20-24 with two tries in the first fifteen minutes, both of which were converted. Didsbury, continually involved in entertaining second half’s of late, responded with fine spirit to score their third and fourth tries of the match. The third try game from quick recycled ball finding try-machine Dave Hoare out wide, who managed to sneak in at the corner. The fourth try was created by a good rolling maul releasing number 8 James Eames down the blind side to touch down without a defender laying a finger on him. At 32-24 and the game nearing the end, Aspatria managed a forth try of their own out wide. With the resulting conversion right on the touch line there seemed little hope of the conversion going over, but the kicker slotted the kick and the score was 32-31. From the kick off Aspatria immediately returned to Didsbury territory, and a baffling decision by the referee presented a simple penalty kick in front of the posts. Again the kick was successful and Aspatria had cruelly snatched a victory. But the referee deemed there was just enough time to kick off. Didsbury mustered one final effort and turned the ball over to their advantage, some way out from the posts the ball came to Gaz Oakley in the pocket. Unfortunately the drop goal, and the chance of victory, missed, and the referee blew for fulltime.

Yet another entertaining game at Ford Lane, and the regular visitors have been treated to some fine rugby this season. Didsbury will be happy to pick up a further two bonus points, strengthening their hold on a mid-table position – which would have been a realistic target after their promotion last season.

Next Saturday Didsbury make the journey to Whitehaven.