Manchester 2's put in strong performance against 4th place Norhwich

The home side started well and with Northwich pressuring the Manchester line, the home side’s defence was strong enough to deny the visitors from crossing the white wash.
Manchester managed to clear their lines and work they way up the field and eventually found themselves camped on the Northwich line. Their efforts were rewarded 15 minutes into the game when veteran prop Ben Gordon picked and drove from the base of a ruck to go over in the corner for the first try of the game, the try successfully converted by fly half Chris Lloyd to give Manchester a 7-0 lead.
It wasn’t long before the visitors managed to get on the score board when flanker Lucas Shelbourne was penalised in front of the post for going in the side of a ruck. 5 minutes later Northwich Managed to get within one point when Manchester were again penalised in a kickable position this time for hands in the ruck. Manchester seemed to switch off for the remaining 20 minutes of the first half and a succession of stupid penalties allowed the visitors to gain valuable yards into the Manchester half.
Northwich got their 1st try of the game when the ball shot out of the back of the Manchester scrum allowing the Northwich open side to pick the ball up and sprint the 25 meters to score under the post. A lack of communication in defence lead to Northwich’s second try of the game when their centre managed to burst through a huge gap to score with 5 minutes of the half left.
The second half saw Manchester get their act back together, playing the kind of rugby that they had been playing in the opening 20 minutes. The forwards were starting to get on top in the set piece with hooker Chris Gough claiming 4 balls against the head. Wanting to keep the tempo of the game high Manchester opted to run penalties at every opportunity and carries from No8 Brian Ndlovu and man of the match captain Paul Farrington kept the home side in the visitors half. This was also backed up by centre Shay McCullough who, despite a shoulder injury, was taking countless crash balls to gain yards. Try as they might though, the Northwich defence held firm and with a number of chances spurned by a poor final pass or missing overlaps the home side couldn’t capitalise on their work. With no score in the second half the visitors ended up taking the game 18 points to 7.

Squad: 1) Ben Gordon (1T), 2) Ollie Jones, 3) Dan Peake, 4) Dom Thomas, 5) Paul Farrington (c) (MoM), 6) Zee Khan, 7) Lucas Shebourne, 8)Brian Ndlovu, 9) Richard Leach 10) Chris Lloyd (1C), 11) Josh Wilde, 12) Shay McCullough, 13) Dave Melville, 14) James Hoggard, 15) Calum Hendry.
Subs: 16) Chris Gough (for Peake 30mins)