March Bears topple high-flying Mistley in low-scoring league affair

March Bears produced a brilliant defensive display on a wet and windy Saturday to topple high-flying Mistley 14-7 on home soil.

It was never likely to be a high-scoring affair in the conditions with handling difficulty and kicks not always going where they were intended.

However, what did occur was a terrific match of technical defensive brilliance and one in which until the last five minutes the Bears had not allowed their line to be breached.

Mistley were a team on a winning streak and was in the top three of the league before this game.

In a game almost solely played in the middle half of the pitch, March tested the defence of Mistley and in the 11th minute, Danny Grieve made a terrific angled break down the middle of the pitch and found George Paul on his shoulder who took the ball all the way and under the posts.

Paul converted his own try taking the score to 7-0 and that is how it stayed until half-time with neither side willing to give in the remainder of the opening period.

The second half started with neither side having any advantage from the wind as it swept through the pitch from side to side but a fantastic team effort saw Ciaran Brown go over in the left-hand corner after five minutes of the restart.

George Paul then took the conversion which saw the ball sail over the posts from what looked an impossible angle, especially in these conditions.

March now had a two-try gap and up to this point had shown no relenting to Mistley.

Even when Dan Ryan was yellow-carded for a high tackle in the 61st minute, March did not show any weakness while down to 14 players for 10 minutes.

In the last five minutes, Mistley managed to breach the line from a turnover situation.

One of their locks touched down which looked as if it had been knocked on but it was too little too late for the high flyers in any case.

This was a superb display from the Bears and compared to their previous heavy loss at Bedford this was in a different category and one they should rightly be proud of.

Mistley were good opponents in what was a juddering defensive display played in a very fair manner by both teams.

Man of the Match could not be given to one player so two of these defensive titans, Billy Dean and George Gowler were awarded it jointly.