Manchester vs Eccles

In a hastily arranged fixture Manchester travelled to Eccles with just 13 players. After the large number of cancellations during the winter both sides were keen to get some rugby played - but the rustiness really showed.

With 6 changes from the team that started against Bowden last week, a number of players playing out of position and two "loan" players from the home side Manchester still managed to started the more promising of the two sides. This endeavour was left unrewarded when on at least five occasions hard won overlaps were not executed as passes went to floor or mid-field runners crabbed across removing space from those outside.

Manchester's pattern of play was significantly disrupted when Connor, being injured in the act of scoring the first try, had the leave the field with just a few minutes played. This resulted in scrums being "uncontested" and while this assured possession it also allowed defences to organise and stifle attacks. On one of the few occasions when the ball saw some daylight a break down the middle of the field saw Ned deliver a long and inch perfect pass to Ollie running at full tilt near halfway. With work still to do he rounded his opposite number and stepped inside the cover to score near the posts. Shortly after Ollie was on the score sheet again when he came infield from his wing and, appearing outside the Centres, ran an arch to cross near the corner giving Manchester a 0 - 15 half time lead.

The second half, much like the last third of the first, descended onto a rucking & mauling arm wrestle where any attempts to play open rugby were thwarted by poor decision-making, poor handling and an inability to provide quick ball. Having lost Connor and with players on and off the sidelines for reasons of injury or sin bins the 11 or so Manchester players worked manfully to manufacture the win, it was strength sapping stuff but by no means pretty!. Credit to Eccles as they fought back and scored a well-deserved try to counter the two further Manchester second half scores from Louis.

While lack of a cutting edge and inconsistent passing in the mid-field can be explained by the mid-field being away skiing, Manchester were just too slow to the breakdown and their tackling was mostly just too high - allowing Eccles ball carries to stay on their feet and for mauls to develop. On a positive note the lineout functioned well with Ned, topping off a fine all-round performance, by consistently delivering clean ball to Louis. Also, Smithy put in some telling tackles, Pickles was reminded about the duties of hooker, Callum was a constant nuisance (and occasionally on-side) in the mauls, Tom & Kyle discovered playing in the backs is a look harder then it looks and there were more positives then negatives in everyone's play.

This might not have been a huge step forward for the squad but it was no step backwards.