Bury travelled to Eagle expecting a tougher challenge

Bury travelled to Eagle expecting a tougher challenge than they had faced so far this season. In a narrow loss of 22-19 they secured a losing bonus point to stay second in the league.

In a feisty encounter, Eagle were to open the scoring with a penalty for an infringement at the breakdown, a dubious decision from the official and not the last of the afternoon. This gave Bury the wake up call that they needed and after some dominant mauling from the Bury pack led by James Swinburn, the ball was distributed by Karl Simpson to Adam Heath for a sublime cross-field kick to find the unmarked pace merchant Sam Ware. The score was converted to give the visitors a four point lead.

In an even, yet bad tempered passage of play Eagle were to be reduced to fourteen men after their prop-forward was adjudged to have committed foul play and sent to the sin bin. with the ten minutes passing quickly, neither team could make inroads into the opposition defence, on the occasion Bury were able to breach the Eagle defence, the ball was deemed not to have been sufficiently grounded and a 22 metre drop out was awarded, to the surprise of the Bury contingent. Still feeling aggrieved, a missed tackle in the Bury midfield allowed the home side to take a slender lead into the half-time break.

Following the break, tempers were still high and the second and third sin binning of the game were to follow - one for each side. In this period the home side were to stretch their lead further with another try.

With a die hard spirit Bury were not to give up and with some quick thinking by Karl Simpson, a break from the side of the ruck after a dummy pass allowed the scrum-half to dart into the opposition half. A smart pass enabled the Bury centre combination of Ben and Lawrence Shedwick to move the ball across the field in a fluid motion. This allowed winger, Elliott Naylor a clear path to the try line where he grounded the ball whilst avoiding the trailing defence.

The home side were again to rely with a break away try following Bury's failure to secure a bobbling ball. Again Bury were to rally and man-of-the-match Sam Ware was on hand to dance and weave his way to the line to bring the visitors within three points of Eagle. With time against the the travelling side were unable to convert territorial advantage and had to settle for a losing bonus point and their first loss of the season.

Bury will now face Hutton at home next Saturday in a 3pm kick-off.

A. Townsend