Novos 38, Nth Shields 17 - Chatered

Just the one change to the selected squad as Luke Foster came in for the unavailable Ben Merrett.

We started strongly with our set piece looking stronger than Nth Shields in line out and scrum. From a kickable penalty Pete Twentyman chose to play to the corner. His players backed his decision up by driving a 5 man line out over with Daniel Shuttleworth getting on the ball at the back of the maul. Nice conversion by Shaun Stewart for 7-0.

We did not get the exit right and invited pressure that Nth Shields perhaps hadn't earned. They hammered away at our line for 4-5 mins and we held fast around the fringes. However, they eventual moved the ball for a try built on hard graft and a lot of carries. Novos us 7-5.

Nth Shields struggled somewhat at set piece as the tight five of Josh Stacey, Daniel Shuttleworth, Pete Twentyman, Kit Sorenson and Tom Cox powered forward. We could have had several scrum penalties as our opponents were unable to stay square whilst retreating. In addition, Tom Cox was causing all sorts of issues on their line out throws.

Dominating the set piece gave us the front foot and Lewis Chater was thriving at scrum half making breaks around the ruck and returning some wayward kicks. One line break was fed to Rich Harrison to sprint away from the defenders trying to chase him down. Well struck conversion added for a 14-5 lead.

Nth Shields had some big ball carriers but we were doing our best to chop them down. Jez Nash turned one of their lads over at a ruck with Kit Sorenson coming in to play 9 off the turnover. He brilliantly scanned for space and the big second rower went down the blind side and put in some big strides before coming face to face with their 15. By this time Lewis Chater had come up on the inside and received a perfect pass from Sorenson. Novos stretching the lead to 19-5.

We were playing pretty well at a decent tempo and prevented Nth Shields from getting on the front foot. Lewis Chater was finding a lot of space at the edge of the ruck and was off again. Jez Nash supported the break perfectly and went over to make the half time score 26-5.

Nth Shields came out for the second half with renewed energy and carried hard over the gain line. Within two mins they had smashed their way over for a try from some one pass rugby. Simple but effective, conversion added, 26-12 - game on.

We got a bit loose at this stage of the fixture and went away from what had worked in the first half. We did score a fine try by Ben Wollerton down the blind side but Nth Shields added one themselves to make it 31-17.

Novos finished the stronger and Josh Stacey smashed through the defensive line for a converted try to end the fixture at 38-17, a six try to three victory.

Thank you to Rebecca Rees for officiating the match - thought you did well.

Cheers to the North Shields lads - plenty of endeavour and heart which will hopefully get you a few wins and away from the relegation zone.

Great for the lads to get the second win of the season with some fine performances up front. I thought the pack were excellent throughout with power in the scrum and smarts in the line out. It helped that Nth Shields were reluctant to compete at most set pieces and we were clever when they chose not to compete.

Player of the Day was Lewis Chater with mentions in dispatches to Darren Kelly. I thought both players were excellent - worked hard, clever throughout and had big moments in the game.

Richard of the Day went to Darren Kelly for leaving his bag at Nth Shields when we left.

Next week we are at home to Horden - so it's back to training to work on tempo and width for our opponents on Saturday.

Up the Vos !