Bury made the brave decision to field two teams on the same day despite missing some key players who were away on school duties. Two mixed teams with only one or two substitutes meant that everyone got some good game time and resulted in two enjoyable matches. It was excellent to see so many players excelling given the opportunity and it will certainly make future team selection an even harder job.

The morning kick-off was away to Beccles - a bit of a trip for a teenage squad not always renowned for their early morning prowess. As if to hammer home this lack of early morning clarity, the opening kick was promptly dropped, and Beccles applied sufficient pressure to score an unconverted try. This was followed by further Beccles possession as Bury struggled to gain much of a foothold in the match. It took until the 11th minute before Bury opened their account, a nice pick and go from the base of a strong scrum by Kai Tan who sped away to score out wide. Captain Nico Marchini successfully converted from near the touchline to give Bury the lead and more importantly stir the visiting squad from their slumbers.

The set piece play remained evenly balanced but, on 14 minutes, the intensity of Bury’s tackling helped turn defence into an opportunity to attack. Finlay Blair intelligently took advantage of a three on two breakaway to release winger Ollie Cooper, who ran three quarters of the pitch for an excellent try. Thomas Treneman was playing well in the second row, making good ground and Bury appeared to be taking control. However, Beccles looked dangerous when they did break and only a superb covering tackle by Harry Wooldridge prevented a certain score. Just as Bury seemed to have secured a half-time lead Beccles scored and converted to leave things all square at 12-12.

Early in the second half Harry Wooldridge made a strong run deep into Beccles territory, before Nico Marchini took over and touched down for a lovely try - the only problem being that he was 5 metres short of the actual try-line! Fortunately, Thomas Treneman was on hand to pick up and finish the job by driving over.

On 9 minutes man of the match Finlay Blair threw a dummy pass from fly-half and went through the slight gap this created for an excellent solo try out of nowhere. He converted his own score to leave Bury 24-12 up with a quarter of an hour remaining. However, Beccles fought straight back and scored a converted try of their own to narrow the margin to five points again.

With Bury nerves just beginning to jangle slightly, it was left to captain Nico Marchini to secure a hard-fought victory with a strong steal and typical run, touching down on the correct line this time around. The game was played out in good spirits and there were many encouraging performances across the whole squad to leave the final score at 29-17 to Bury.

Man of the Match (Forwards): Harry Wooldridge
Man of the Match (Backs): Finlay Blair
Most improved (Forwards): Toby Coogan
Most improved (Backs): Ralph Cooper