Bury Sport

Bury 35 North Manchester 7

4:30pm Thursday 26th January 2012

BURY showed they have the character and class to avoid relegation with a resounding victory over North Manchester.

The fourth-bottom Radcliffe Road men moved to within a point of their opponents, who are two places above them, after outplaying them.

Bury were by far the top scorers in the division on the day, with the other seven teams who played mustering only 43 points between them. After a fairly even first half, the local lads stepped up a gear to score virtually at will.

They had a dream start, when a ruck on the left saw centre Morgan Reidy feed wing Blake Roberts who scored an unconverted try in the corner.

Bury were unlucky when a move between Reidy and Roberts was deemed offside, denying a certain try.

However, Bury were not to be denied for long and the influential Roberts was fed by Ben Holland with a clever overhead tap pass and he touched down for an unconverted try.

The visitors had the last word of the half with a converted try. But Bury controlled the game after the break.

They started with a penalty, landed by stand-off Dave Herbert, then a move involving Holland and Smithson, who could have scored himself, led to hooker Jon Allen touching down.

Impressive scrum half Mike Livesey harrassed North following a Bury drive, and picked up to score an unconverted opportunist try.

Holland added two further tries, the first of which was converted, to complete the rout. Both scoring moves started inside the North Manchester 22 where he picked up from the base and produced an impressive combination of side-steps and hand-offs before grounding successfully.

Bury travel to leaders Littleborough on Saturday kick-off 2.15pm.

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