Battling Vets find the going tough at Bury

Bury St Edmunds III 26

Royston Vets 0

ROYSTON Vets certainly met their match against an unbeaten Bury St Edmunds side on Saturday with the hosts running out 26-0 winners.

The Crows started the match the better of the two teams, with their quickly rucked balls constantly recycling, and as a result made holes in the Bury defence.

And it was only some last gasp tackling that stopped Martin Deards getting cleanly away. However, Royston's play was disrupted moments later when full-back Tony Payne pulled up with a hamstring injury.

His replacement Rob Spragg was soon into his stride, as Bury peppered him with long kicks deep into the Royston defensive area.

But in Joe Holman the Crows had a man in form and his jumps and catches in the lineout, movement around the park, and tough tackling won him the man-of-the-match award.

However, despite Holman's best intentions, Bury started to take control and began to find the corners with well-placed long kicks.

From this position they used their strong close runners and eventually crashed over to score, before a second followed shortly before half time.

The second half was much the same as Royston scrapped for the ball. Rab Bassett was a dynamo as he often picked up loose ball to charge at the opposition only to find his gained yardage lost as the Bury side quickly regained possession.

Royston needed to tackle well and that was epitomised by returning Steve Luckman, whose ability to bring down and turn the player often stopped the Bury attacks.

However, as the second half progressed, Bury brought on more fresh legs, and eventually ran out winners with a scoreline which did not really reflect the margin of their superiority.

Royston Vets: Bassett, Howell, Boyce, Cottrell, Rice, Holman, Richardson, Luckman, Barker, Dacey, Lawrence, Bristow, Deards, Wallis, Payne. (Subs): Bergen, Spragg.