Battling Bulls are let down by poor tackles

Midlands 5 East (South)

St Ives Bulls 5 Bedford Queens 40

UNDER-STRENGTH St Ives Bulls were no match for their powerful visitors despite getting off to a strong start.

Kicking downhill, St Ives began the half brightly. Taking the game to the visitors, Ives spent much of the opening period in the Queens' half.

Strong running and confident play with the ball in hand saw Bulls mount a series of sustained attacks that Bedford struggled to cope with - but the final edge was missing and the visitors held their line intact.

Not to be denied, Bulls continued hammering away and were finally rewarded when James Cannon caught the Bedford defence napping by slipping several tackles and chipping through for Ben Pinion to make it 5- 0 to St Ives.

Despite more possession the hosts were unable to convert it into points. Bulls wingers Mark Houlden and James Bennett enjoyed several decent attacking runs off the back of this possession, and were ably backed up with good supporting runners.

Scrum-half Nigel Sweeny ensured that play was intelligent and when the ball was cleared from the breakdown, the forwards - notably Steve Burke and Pete Hammond - were on hand to support the backs.

The Queens came more into the game and with the extra possession that they were gaining were able to score at regular intervals, taking advantage of poor tackling from St Ives to seal victory.

Bulls captain Pete Hammond said: "We played our socks off and competed well in every area of the game. We suffered with injuries early on but our subs stepped up to the mark capably. The one important area where we let ourselves down was the tackling."

* St Ives' next match is at Biggleswade on Saturday.

* In Midlands East 6 (South), St Neots won 24-17 at Stamford College, while St Neots III enjoyed a 31-5 victory against Biggleswade.