Centres of Excellence

A Didsbury side inspired by their centre partnership of Tom Makin and James Turner ran riot scoring 11 tries securing a 67-7 victory over Hutton.

Didsbury’s match day squad was missing their top try scorer Dave Hoare, and co-vice-captain flanker Dave Foster. There was also some squad rotation as Ed Taplin started at prop which meant the talismanic Tony Ames started on the bench.
In a dramatic change to recent weeks, the match was played in bright and sunny conditions and a decent crowd welcomed bottom of the league side Hutton to Ford Lane. Toc H started the game at pace, and immediately it was clear that the visiting side was going to struggle to contain a very lively Didsbury backline. Set piece moves were disregarded as time and again first phase ball was enough to break through the defensive line, with half backs Will Luffman and Gaz Oakley combining well. Tries in the first half came as regular as the recent rainstorms, with James Turner (3), Ed Taplin, Mark Chambers, Enita Okodiko (2) and Tom Makin all crossing the whitewash before the halftime break.

The second half was certainly a tighter affair with full credit going to Hutton who never gave up and showed that there could be better results on the horizon for them. Didsbury scored 3 more tries with Okodiko completing his hatrick, and further tries from Makin and Mark Harrison galloped in late on. Hutton also manged to break their duck with a consolation try.

Too many good performances to pick out a man of the match, but the freshness of the centres (Makin and Turner) was a revelation, as was the devastating running of winger Okidiko. Also Mark Chambers was busy at blindside flanker carrying the ball well, and breaking up attacks with backrow colleague Aidan Murphy.

The bonus point victory takes Didsbury up to joint third in the league, and next Saturday they visit Garstang.