Witness Saturday’s scores as 2nd spot Fylde fail to get any points by losing at home, to high hitting Hinckley who have won 8/9 games since the end of November! Other results did help Stour to move into 6th place as Chester, Loughborough and Sheffield all lost. Stour’s excellent win keeps them a nose ahead of the chasing sides in the form of Tynedale and Wharfedale.

Scunthorpe are a plucky side and, make no mistake, this was a special scoreline that included a dozen Tries that not even top spot Caldy have been able to achieve. They, and Otley, are the only two teams to do double figure Try games (9 November and 7 December) whilst the dozen for Stour included a well deserved hatrick for Jack Lea and a brace for Dan Rundle moving him away from the chasing pack of top try scorers.

Given Stour’s injuries and absences, this performance is a great testament to Neil Mitchell and his coaching team of Alex Davidson and Rhys Pritchard.

After a missed penalty chance for Scunthorpe Centre, Paul Cook and, for a second week running, it was the Heatley Rundle combination that started the scoreboard rolling on the 15-minute mark. This time it was Dan Rundle’s break that returned the previous favours and Joe Heatley took full advantage for an excellent opening score. The hosts then lost their Fly Half, Will Robinson, to a Yellow Card and Stour took full advantage of the situation opting for a penalty kick to touch. Enter Jack “Bowling Ball” Lea who latched on to the clean possession and crashed over for the first of his trio and in ‘trade mark ‘style. Chris Scott added the extras followed by two more conversions for well-worked Tries by Rundle and Mark Harrison.

26 minutes gone and with a Bonus Point in the bag, Stour were then able to stretch their lead courtesy of Llyr Griffiths on the half hour. Scott’s conversion made it 0-33. However, both sides lost players (No 8 Ben Hyde and Stour’s Matt Perks), to Yellow Cards but Scunthorpe had the last word of the half after a raking penalty kick deep into the visitors’ territory set up a lineout. The ball came into the hands of back row, Jacob Hardy whose elusive running took him past the Stour defence for an unconverted score and followed immediately by a shrill few blasts from the whistle of referee Tim Allatt.

Stourbridge supporters had already witnessed the return of Josh Trinham on the wing, replacing an injury prone Reece Beddows after just 60 seconds of play! Josh played his last game for Stour, 2 seasons ago when he made an early exit from the Macclesfield pitch, after a nasty collision. Since then, Josh has been playing his rugby for Dings Crusaders and in Canada whilst attempting completion of his studies. It took just 7 minutes into the 2nd half for the ball to be sent down the back line for him to score in the corner.

The hosts’ answered soon after when teenage right wing (also Josh) Clarke set off on a 50-metre dash, which eventually put Gavin Mist over the Try Line. The next few passages of play by both sides went unrewarded until Stef Thorp bagged another well earnt Try closely followed by ‘seconds’ from Jack Lea and Dan Rundle. Lea then iced his own cake with a third. Chris Scott knocked over the three consecutive conversions and with 5 minutes remaining, the crowd of just 124 spectators thought it was all over.

However, with the loss of Stour replacement Nick Murphy (Yellow Card), Scunthorpe Centre, Paul Cooke had obviously not read the script and his score on 78 minutes was enough to give the hosts a small window of opportunity that may have seen them win a 7th Bonus Point. Not so! Hopes faded as Stour turned on the after burners and spent the last 60 seconds scoring 12 points in the form of Arthur Morgan and Chris Scott Tries. Scott converted his own effort thus earning himself a personal tally of 21 points for the afternoon’s efforts.

Next Saturday (8th February) Stourbridge entertain Preston Grasshoppers who currently lie in 15th place with just four wins under their collective belts. One of these was a home win against Stour (20-7) and they had a notable draw against 2nd place Fylde (24-24).

This should be an exciting and entertaining game so we look forward to seeing a big crowd on what promises to be a great afternoon’s rugby!