Lansdowne and Mary battled it out for the first 10 minutes with Mary’s coming out the better at 3 points up. Unfortunately that would be the last bit of Mary’s dominance for the first half.
After a disallowed Mary’s try heads went wayward and lansdowne got in for a handy try after a lose Mary’s clearance kick followed by poor tackling lead to the lansdowne 10 scoring under the posts converted.
Further poor defence from Mary’s saw the host score another converted try despite the ball flying out of Lansdownes ruck 3 metres forward. Score 17 to 3.
Lansdowne pressure resulted in another break from their centre who did well to score from 40 metres out. A great linebreak from the home side.
Marys manage a good individual try after a nice step from Cal Gray saw him score under the posts.
Half time. 24 – 8
Mary’s started brilliantly in the second half. Stealing the kick off, winning a penalty and mauling over to make it 24-15. A very happy Colm Smith getting up after some great assistance from the pack.
That would be it from the visitors despite being the better team in the second half they couldn’t break down a strong lansdowne team who managed a bonus point try 15 mins from time.
The home side managing to create an opportunity from an overlap.
A mini brawl was the last remaining highlight of the game with a lansdowne forward seeing yellow for punching Mary’s prop McGill.
Final score 31 – 15 and a hard lesson learned by the away team.