Vikings storm to victory at BP Chemicals

BP usually field a very physical forward-orientated team and Saturday was no exception. The conditions were good but Scarborough's first obstacle was getting over the long journey and a rather hurried and shortened warm-up.

This clearly showed in the first 20 minutes with Scarborough finding it difficult to really get going. The forwards played BP at their own game with some powerful running by the forwards with James Leach and Russ Wilkie leading the way.

The line-out was working well with hooker Ian Williams performing his duties well. The only concern being in the scrum where the Scarborough pack were having a torrid time against the BP forwards.

BP were also running strongly at the Vikings defence but with some fine tacking it held firm, including an excellent tackle from Will Leah covering across the pitch to snuff out a strong BP attack.

The home defence was finally breached, good quick distribution from scrum half Toby Welsby allowing first Ryan Fowler then Wilkie to move the ball out to winger Alex Rowley to dive in at the corner. Rowley then converted his own try to get the score board moving at 7-0.

The Scarborough pack then started to get on top of BP combining well with the backs and making inroads at every attack into the BP defence.

The backs were now firing on all cylinders with scrum-half Welsby and stand off Joe Lenton combining well with strong running in the centres from Billy Parker and Fowler producing tries for the latter and winger Matty Metcalfe.

The veteran prop Tom Fish came on in the front row and with BP having to make changes of their own the scrum settled down, however Scarborough still need to sharpen up at the base of the scrum where chances went begging.

The big forwards were now making inroads at every attack deep into BP territory.

Powerful runs from Alessandro Zavatti, Langkilde, Leach, Tom Read and Wilkie were producing the gaps for the team to exploit with further tries coming from Leach, Langkilde and Zavatti.

Rowley had a good day with the boot converting four of the six tries scored for a final scoreline of 38 -0 to the Vikings.

This was another good win away from home to keep the Vikings at the top of the Eastern Merit League gaining another four-try bonus point in the process.

Skipper Simon Dixon led his men well on the day with his man of the match being a toss up between 19-year-old number eight Leach or the veteran second row Wilkie, who at 45 years old, displayed some deft handling and powerful running to gain the accolade. A fine team performance all round.