Barton 2nds 7 Burton Vets 21 on 16th February 2008

Once again Dave Brown survived all the hassle and problems of a late fixture switch to lead his side to victory with this 21-7 defeat of near neighbours Barton. Once again Burton gave their opposition first bite of the cherry to go 7-0 in the lead following an early break by Barton that caught the Burton ranks completely surprised and unprepared.

But Burton soon hit back, and despite stories to the contrary, a welcome reappearance of Paul Davis to the Burton team was followed by him scoring a hat trick that secured the Burton win.

His first try was a superbly executed dummy with Ian Weakford that saw him race through the created gaping hole in the hosts defence. While his second was more mundane just involving a simple catch and dive over the line after his teammates, Huw Davies, Mel Gilbert and Rob Ridley, had done all the hard work.

With ten minutes remaining Davis had succeeded in avoiding getting near the try line for fear of having to buy a jug. However, some masterly activity by Colin Wood, never one to be denied a free drink, managed to produce a ball that Davis had to catch and be carried forward over the line to complete his hat trick. Kev Wrathall converted all three of Davis’s tries to produce this well-deserved 21-7 victory.