Middlesborough punish Mowden Park

A soggy Sunday saw Mowden have a great turn out and possibly one of their strongest squads of the season.

However, Mowden were caught napping and good handling by Middlesborough backs saw them score a try within 2 minutes. This, however, woke Mowden up and for the next 20 minutes, Boro were pegged back, until Mowden boys were caught napping as Boro swapped their backs at the back of a scrum and created an overlap to score.

Mowden must have been thinking about the score as Boro scored again straight from the kick off and another 2 minutes later to take the half time score to 24 - 0.

Boro scored another quick try before Mowden once again got their heads around what they had to do and once again set about breaking down Boro's plays and looking to protect the ball. Another 20 minutes of sustained play saw Sean Thompson crash over to bring the score to 29-5.

Boro had one good play left in them and they took the final score to 34-5.

When Mowden were switched on, they carried the ball well, they tackled well, they disrupted Boro's backs and plays, however, they had very little clean ball once again to set the backs free and the few times that the ball came out to the centre's, it was mishandled or indecision meant the wrong play was made.

Pressure in training will resolve those issues as well as handling drills, but this was certainly a case of panicking on the pitch and perhaps a Halloween hangover.

Switching off against any team deserves to be punished, but Boro were just the team to ensure they capitalised every time Mowden switched off.

Notable players were Alex Fullarton who was back of the match, with his tireless tackling and covering, perhaps too many backs think Alex can stop a whole team of backs, and he certainly tried but needed support on Sunday.

Forwards were generally well drilled for the 2 stints of 20 minutes when they were switched on, with Sean Thompson being notable, but John Allison just pipping him for forward of the match.

If we chopped off the first two minutes of the first half and 7 minutes from the end of the first and beginning of the second half, the score would have been 5-5 ... just think 5-5 .... however, 10 minutes of carelessness means the score was 34-5, an accurate reflection of what we deserved.

We need to keep focused when the ball is live ...

Final Score
Middlesborough 34 : Mowden 5