Sluggish Stortford suffer as DMP soar

ANOTHER desperately slow start cost Bishop's Stortford dearly against an aggressive Darlington Mowden Park side.

DMP had an 18-point lead after 23 minutes, with tries to Shaun McCartney, Brandon Asher-Wood and Euan McKirdy, all well converted in the tricky wind by Warren Seals – with only a ninth-minute penalty to Tom Walker in return.

The home side seemed lethargic in defence and unable to cope with Darlington’s rush defence in attack.

As half-time approached, Stortford finally found extra energy and a halfbreak by Sam Winter fed Seb Brownhill, who slipped the first tackle and dashed over under the posts from 20 metres out. Walker, now looking lively at scrumhalf, converted.

The hosts started the second period much more positively and early possession brought a penalty under the posts and three more points for Walker.

Stortford’s scrum was now right on top and resultant penalties led to a try for Charlie Kingham,

diving over in the corner from the fringes of a ruck.

A second Kingham try from a driving maul followed quickly, putting his side in the lead for the first time but this was shortlived, with DMP kicking a penalty for offside.

Darlington immediately produced the try of the game with a series of offloads out of tackles, as they swept 80 metres for another converted score to Seals on 63 minutes.

Stortford bounced back – Luis Ball scoring an unconverted try out wide from a driving maul with five minutes to go after DMP’s Will Montogmery was sinbinned by they couldn’t close the one-point deficit.