Matlock take the points against bottom side

Matlock secured a rare but welcome victory in their tough season as bottom-of-the-table Peterborough were put to the sword on Saturday.

Matlock were greeted by what could only be described as a carnival atmosphere, the boisterous Peterborough faithful expecting a dominating performance by the home side, but the visitors turned up looking bigger, faster and stronger.

Matlock combined in unison to overpower the Peterborough scrum, and the first try came off the back of one of these instances aas the ball was shipped wide to Mike Allen who bamboozled his man to score in the corner, unconverted.

Mistakes by Matlock gave away a penalty which Peterborough converted, but Henri Packard soon showed his pace by running in a 60 metre scorcher which was also unconverted.

Peterborough had several good phases of play in Matlock’s half, but the visitors forced the mistake which Packard turned into a try, Chris Young converting on this occasion, and Packard soon bagged his hat-trick after good work by Tom Hooton.

The first-half concluded with a well-worked try in the corner, ending with Luke Crofts feeding an extremely flat pass to Nick Coombes to canter over the line, followed by a touchline conversion from Young.

Early in the second-half the cool-headed Young was controversially given ten minutes respite for a rucking offence, and Peterborough immediately responded and crossed the line only to be held up by the resolute Matlock defence.

The forwards then combined well to put Coombes away for his brace, the try unconverted.

This seemed to spur Peterborough into life and they worked hard for a converted try, but after they then infringed ten metres out, Hooton took a quick tap and slithered through the retreating defence to score, Tom Morton converting.

A converted try gave Peterborough a consolation late on, but Matlock were comfortable winners.

This Saturday sees league newcomers Bugbrooke visit the Meadows, kick-off 2.15pm.