Moor U12s battle conditions for worthy victory at Dukinfield

 On a weekend where heavy downpours were predicted we were lucky this fixture was able to take place. It was a very heavy pitch as expected but Moor still managed to produce some great flowing rugby with a great team ethic, that saw the team's winning run continue. 

On first viewing Dukinfield looked a bigger and stronger outfit than we had previously come up against and this proved to be so. It was only Moor's fast hands and intelligent rugby that led to the first try scored by Dan McDonagh, which he dutifully converted. Further dominance from Moor resulted in Chris Williams receiving the ball on the wing with yards to make and plenty of defenders to beat, but a bulldozing charge saw him break several tackles and bustle over the line with great strength and determination to score Moor's second try, again converted by Dan.

Dukinfield then made good, hard yards with their pack to run in a try to get themselves back in the game. This proved to be a wake up call for our forwards who then became focused and worked hard as a unit to negate Dukinfield's powerful individuals at the breakdown, giving quick ball to the backs and disrupting what little play Dukinfield had. With Dukinfield looking to end the half on a high with a rolling maul towards the Moor try line it took great strength from Jack Briggs (who had led from the front in the forwards all game) to rip the ball out and offload to Dan, who chased his own kick down field and score his second try. As the half came to a close Mike Ingham's exciting darts and work rate paid off when he benefited from excellent rucked ball from the pack to run in the fourth try. This left Moor 24-14 up at the break. 

The second half got off to an excellent start when the creative midfield trio of Dan, Nye and Gabriel linked up fluently to unleash Gabriel on a mazy run to score Moor's fifth try, which was converted. On the whole Moor's tackling was very good, in particular Joe Hayward, the first forward to have the highest tackle count in a game all season, but our inability to bring down the opposition's bruising number 8 was evident as we let two more converted tries in over the course of the game.

The tiring Dukinfield forwards began to feel the pressure in the latter stages allowing captain Oli Nylan and Aiden O'Malley to power over the opposition line, giving Dan the opportunity to convert two more tries. Well done to the whole squad for the great performance in very difficult conditions, the hard yards being put in in training are becoming more evident on match days.

 Cheers,Dunc