Counties 3 Midlands East (North East)

Bingham 1st XV 12 Newark 2nd XV 26

Report by Bob Walker

After last week's heroics when a makeshift 2nd XV earned a valiant (but pointless) draw away at third-placed Cleethorpes, this was a morale-boosting victory in the mud against a dogged Bingham team which refused to give in and at one point threatened to make an unlikely comeback.

Early on Newark threatened to run away with the game as they built on a solid platform created by the twin threats of a dominant scrum and fly half Matt Cox's outstanding kicking which time and again blunted the Bingham attack.

Newark raced to a 21 point lead in the first quarter only for Bingham to fight back and score the only try of the second half. But, despite not troubling the electronic scoreboard in that second period, some determined defending of their own was enough to earn a deserved victory.

Credit also has to go to 51 year old Dave Garland, playing his first game in two years after receiving an emergency SOS call on Friday after Rhys Overland was called up into the 1st XV squad.
Garland, normally a back rower, played at scrum half and on several occasions used his power to act as an extra forward and break the gain line. Also worth a mention was evergreen front row forward Dick White who had a brief run out from the replacement's bench. Although the 57-year-old came off with a nasty leg injury, he had gone into the unfamiliar position of second row. Our scrum didn't retreat and continued its overwhelming dominance.

Newark took an early lead when centre Ed Armstrong - making a welcome return - chased a well-placed kick from Cox. Armstrong hacked the ball on twice before diving over for the opening try. Cox nailed the tricky conversion.

Shortly afterwards Newark turned defence into attack after a trademark Armstrong tackle deep in our 22. Winger Harry Lee broke down the left flank before feeding inside to Ethan Mason. The Number Eight backed himself and made the line from around half way for a try which was converted by Cox.

Newark stretched to lead to 21 points after combative flanker Ben Samuel crashed through two tackles to go over near the posts.

To their credit , Bingham were not cowed. Their fly half was able to make significant ground with his kicks to touch following a succession of penalties and if their scrum was a mess, their line out was solid for most of the match. A rolling maul following a line out on our 5 metre mark ended in their first try out wide which was well converted. However, Newark's bonus point try was earned when Lee charged down an attempted clearance kick and grounded the bouncing ball.

The first half ended with Bingham pounding away on the Newark line but some great defence held them at bay to keep the score at 7-26.

The second period was a strange affair. Newark continued to march Bingham backwards in the set piece but were unable to capitalise on their scrum dominance. We tackled hard in the face of some decent handling by Bingham which defied the conditions. One such flowing attack enabled them to go over in the corner for the only score of the second half.

So this was a victory based on a dominant first half. Next up - a challenging long trip to Grimsby who currently lie just one place above us.

Tries: Ed Armstrong. Ethan Mason. Ben Samuel. Harry Lee.
Conversions Matt Cox (3)