London 1 North - Bury St Edmunds 59 Old Colfeians 11

The 1st XV players at Bury responded to a difficult week with a superb performance, running in nine tries to completely overwhelm Colfeians.

The Londoners arrived on the back of four consecutive victories, but from the opening moments of the match it was clear that there would only be one winner.

The players’ motivation for victory was enhanced in the knowledge that influential flank forward Tony Fox was playing his last game for the club before returning to New Zealand.

Two tries in the opening five minutes effectively ended the contest before it had begun.

Within 90 seconds of the kick-off, Bury scored their first try. Matt Edison, back from his sojourn at Cambridge, had a barnstorming game and his 60-metre dash and offload to full-back Barry Frost got the scoreboard into action.

Within minutes, the two were instrumental again as they broke through some ineffectual tackling to supply Tim Mann the scoring pass.

The game in south London earlier in the season had shown that Bury were too quick for their opposite numbers out wide, but they had proved very competent up front.

Bury, however, were in no mood to let Colfe’s slow the game down and turn it into a dogfight.

The side swept forward at every opportunity with forwards and backs linking superbly.

True, at times Bury came up against some spirited defending, but the support play and handling at pace was joy to watch.

Further tries from Edison, Martin and Kearney followed, but the pick of the first half scores followed an amazing break from his own 22 by Krammer.

Playing unusually out on the wing, he danced through several would-be tacklers before offloading to Eggars who in turn found Tim Mann to storm down the touchline and in by the posts. Colfe’s only reply in the half came from two early penalties.

The second half inevitably could not quite live up to the heights reached in the first but Bury, who were deducted 25 points for fielding an ineligible player earlier in the week, still scored three more tries as they continued to press.

Despite the backs – Eggars and Mann in particular – making several breaks, it was the forwards who scored all three tries.

No.8 Kearney appeared to have scored from a driving maul but the referee was unsighted, however, Fox ensured he would get on the scoresheet when he sneaked over from the resulting ruck.

Colfe’s did manage to score when a penalty was kicked deep into the Bury 22 and, from the resulting catch-and-drive, replacement prop Williams powered over.

The try only spurred Bury on to finish the game on a hig, Mike Lagudi scoring his first try for the 1st XV when he just managed to ground the ball at full stretch.

The final try went to skipper Webdale who cut a great angle back on fly-half Will Martin to crash over.

Appropriately, Fox, who skippered the side up until Christmas, converted the final two tries before the final whistle was blown.