Wirral Withstand Late Beverley Surge

Before the start of the game all the teams had a minute’s applause in memory of 28 year old 4th Team player, Matthew “Bungle” Price who died earlier this week.
For our first ever game against Beverley, Wirral made changes following injuries incurred in last week’s game at Billingham. It was good to see ROB PEARL and JAMES ANNETTS come back into the team after being on the injury list for a number of weeks, replacing DAVE DONEO (hamstring injury) and DANNY HARVEY respectively, with the latter moving to fly half in place of BEN BROOKS. MIKE WARREN moved into the back row and JOSH (IAN) STEAD made his first team debut at scrum half. The subs were CHRIS HUGHES, CHRIS BURROWS and COLIN DYER.
Wirral were playing against the breeze towards the main road and the early pressure was coming from Wirral. Beverley looked to use their backs to run out of their half when ALI BAKER intercepted the pass to his winger and ran in unopposed to score under the posts, DANNY HARVEY converted. 7-0 (5 mins). At this stage there was not much to choose between the sides and on being awarded a penalty; Phil Duboulay converted from 40m out. 7-3 (15 mins). At this stage, Beverley lost their second row through injury.
In the driving mauls it was good to see Wirral making good gains of 30m plus which allowed Wirral to get down into the opposition half. The backs on both sides looked capable of making breaks in what was an open game. On 27 minutes, Wirral were attacking on the 20m line when MIKE WARREN put in a teasing kick to the Beverley line and with the ball bouncing around both he and the Beverley player missed the ball leaving DANNY HARVEY to dive on the loose ball to score close to the corner flag, the conversion was missed.12-3 (27 mins). From the kick off, Wirral collected, ball went to the blind side where JAMES ANNETTS broke through and on approaching the full back kicked over his head and with ADAM SHELDON in support, he collected and outran the defence to score under the posts and DANNY HARVEY converted. 19-3.
DANNY Harvey put over a penalty from 20m in front of the posts. 22-3. Wirral were in attacking mood and from 70m the move started and a pass to MATT BROWN saw the prop burst through a would be tackler and made some 40m with the line not getting any nearer, he passed on to ROB PEARL who passed on to ALI BAKER to run in from 20m, the conversion was missed. This last try gave Wirral a try bonus point. 27-3.
There had been a number of off the ball incidents and when seen by the referee, resulted in ROB PEARL and the Beverley winger, SAM ATLOLA having a 10 minute enforced rest. In the last play before half time, swift ball out to the right by the Beverley backs allowed full back Mike Kilgannon to score easily in the corner, the conversion was missed. 27-8 at half time.
Wirral made changes at this juncture, CHRIS HUGHES, CHRIS BURROWS and COLIN DYER came on for JACK YARKER, TOM PARRY and MIKE WARREN respectively. Wirral immediately applied pressure to Beverley helped by good long kicks to touch from JAMES ANNETTS and DANNY HARVEY. On 45 mins, Wirral gain the ball some 10m out and the forwards embarked on a push towards the line which resulted in PAUL LEWIS touching down, for the second week in succession. The conversion was missed. 32-8 (48 mins).
With ROB PEARL only returning to the game after 7 matches, it was decided not to risk any further injury and TOM PARRY rejoined the game. (51 mins). A kick downfield saw JAMES ANNETTS who set off on of his runs from 75m out and split the Beverley defence before drawing the Beverley full back and throwing out a long pass to ADAM SHELDON some 30 m out, who ran to the corner cutting inside the defender to score 10m from the posts. DANNY HARVEY converted to give Wirral a 39-8 lead after 54 mins. JACK YARKER came on for MATT BROWN.
In the period between 62 and 73 minutes, Beverley scored three tries, the first when the Beverley centre, Junior Tupai broke through and passed onto Richard Bassey who scored close to the posts. JT set up the next try when a defensive slip by Wirral allowed Tom Shires in and they made the defensive error count. On 73 minutes after pressure on the Wirral line and being held out on a number of thrusts from Beverley, were rewarded when substitute George Rayner dived over in the corner, all 3 were converted by Phil Duboulay to leave the score 39-29.
For the final minutes of the game, Wirral kept play down in the Beverley half and the forwards kept control and gradually edged forward until the referee called for time but not before Wirral had one more attempt at goal from some 35 m out.
Whilst Wirral enjoyed the victory it was somewhat tarnished by allowing Beverley to get back into this game and for them to also earn a try bonus point. Next week the first team has a free Saturday (England V All Blacks) and on the 15th have their longest journey of the season to Westoe (South Shields –Newcastle area). There will be a coach for this trip if anyone wishes to come along and support the team.
Please support the fund raising for Matt Price, which will be on going during the next few months.

Richard McNeil

Photos from the game