Moor opened this season’s league campaign at Green Lane against Vale of Lune, a side that they had not played for over 25 years and one that had been two divisions higher the previous season; Moor having been promoted at the end of the season and Vale being relegated. Nonetheless, the visitors were expected to provide a very stern test and were expected to dominate proceedings from the start. In the event, this was not to prove the case, not for the first half hour at any rate.

Moor flew out of the blocks from the whistle and if the visitors thought it was going to be a stroll in the mid-September sunshine, they were in for a nasty shock. Within 5 minutes, Moor had opened the scoring following a break down the blindside and  winger Ivan Smetana was put away to score a try wide out, fly-half Martin Shelley just missing the conversion. Moor continued to have the run of the game as the expected onslaught from the larger Vale forwards did not materialise and what success the visitors did have was cancelled out by solid defence. Moor’s next score came after 12 minutes and proved to be the best of the match and in the opinion of many home supporters, the best that has been seen at Green Lane for many a year. A move that started from broken play was taken on by centre Martin Snidal who then linked up with Smetana and slick inter-passing between them both left the opposition’s back line rooted to the spot, as scrum-half Felipe Silva was up in support to take the final pass to score, giving Shelley an easy conversion. The try seemed to have stunned the opposition as 4 minutes later, the home side won a heel against the head and the ever-alert Silva darted through a massive gap to race 50 metres to score under the posts, Shelley again converting. Silva completed his hat-trick on the half-hour when he picked up from a ruck and sniped through the cover to score, with a conversion following. With the Green Lane side now 26-0 ahead, the prospect of an unexpected victory began to look a possibility, but it also stung the Vale forwards into action as, from the restart, they charged through a frail home defence to score an unconverted try followed by another, this time converted, 5 minutes later, to make the interval score 26-12.

The ferocity of the half-time talk by the visitor’s coach could well have been heard back in Lancaster and it did the trick, as from the start of the second half it was obvious that the ball would be kept amongst their forwards and the superior weight and size would be used to bulldoze their way through the Moor defence. This proved to be very effective as four tries and three conversions were to be scored by Vale without reply during the half and left the home side’s forwards feeling very battered. A final score of 38-26 came as a huge relief for the opposition and an equally huge disappointment for Moor. On reflection however, if at the start the Moor supporters had been offered a 12 point loss whilst scoring four tries, one of which was out of the top drawer, I think that most would have settled for this and especially as it proved to be a highly entertaining contest. The Moor players should take a lot from the game as it showed that they are able to mix it with the best in the league and they should have no qualms for the rest of the campaign.

This Saturday, Moor travel to Cumbria where they play Upper Eden, k.o. 3:00 pm.