Congleton welcomed Linley to Hankinson’s field for this mid table tussle hoping to sneak a win over their nearest and dearest rivals.

The opening stages were a fairly turgid affair on a muddy pitch, and an arm wrestle ensued. The away side were able to rumble over for the opening score, leaving the home defence napping. 7 – 0 to Linley.

The home side were further troubled by the sin binning of hooker Phil Pantaloon who took umbrage with an opposition player and employed some home styled grapple techniques to calm the situation, to the agitation of the referee.

However, in the face of adversity, with 25 minutes gone, Ben Somers opened the scoring for Congleton with a try that will live long in the memory, and was probably the best individual try I have ever had the pleasure to witness. Congleton secured a line out, and shifted the ball out second phase to the raging colossus a full 60m out from the opposing try line.

Somers built up a head of pace which belies a man of his size and stature. He boshed the first defender, before shimmying past the second and entering the green, green grass of open field for 30 metres. As he approached the cover defence, the big man deftly chipped the ball to the surprise off the home crowd. To the bewilderment of onlookers and opposition alike, he recovered his own chip, fended a cover defender and gassed the full back to score under the sticks to rapturous whooping applause. Conversion by Steve Vandersteen to level the scores. 7 – 7.

The Bears were visibly buoyed by this mercurial piece of brilliance, and began to dominate the match. Scrum half Philip Hewitt Humphrey, who was a paragon of the half back art throughout the 80 minutes, orchestrated the next score for the home side. He skilfully picked blind, dummied the cover defence and offloaded to back rower Lincoln Evans to power over the line in the corner. Conversion missed, 12 – 7 at half time.

The Bears dominated the exchanges in the early part of the second period, and were incredibly unlucky not to be awarded a 5 pointer when “Zebo Jr” Kaine Reed dived over from close ranged and was controversially adjudged to have been held up over the line.

Linley then struck back against the run off play, with their back line shifting the ball from left to right for a well worked score to level the match 12 – 12 following a missed conversion.

With the fixture poised on a knife edge, Congleton needed a hero. That man was inspirational prop and skipper Nick Claire Hodson. Following a number of phases in the opposition half, Hodson found himself at first receiver. In a calm and measured fashion, reminiscent of Dan Carter in his prime, Hodson spotted the young and virile figure of Brandon Worrallon the right touchline. The prop threw a shimmering two man miss pass with aplomb to seek out the rampaging youngster who crashed over in the corner to secure a well earned victory for the home side.

Humphrey secured a well deserved man of the match award for an accomplished display at scrum half in terrible conditions.

This result firmly ensconces the Bears in the mid table of North West 4 South, and they will travel to Whitchurch next week with a quiet air of reserved confidence.