A comfortable first league win for Melbourne but not one that they will be particularly proud of. Tupton lacked the quality of the Melbourne team (Especially in the backs) but Melbourne failed to stamp their authority on the game especially up front. 

The Melbourne scrum was under a lot of pressure from a much larger Tupton pack from the start and did not secure good ball until the physical presence of Andy Holden joined in the second half. In the line outs the jumpers caught good ball but Melbourne did very little with it.

The game started with Melbourne swiftly building an unassailable lead with 4 tries in the first 20 minutes, the first by Pete Illot following a charge down by Ian Lucas. The Melbourne backs being able to cut through Tupton with little trouble.

After going behind so quickly Tupton change tactics and tried to upset Melbourne with a more aggressive and physical approach which put the referee under a lot of pressure.

The Melbourne pack despite being poor in the tight was far quicker to the breakdown of the ball and by half time 6 tries had been run in.

The second half was a bit of a mess, Melbourne defended for long periods and only scored two further breakaway tries the final one by the ever green Andy Fulton. The general impression was that Melbourne felt the game was won and that they could play out the 2nd half without really working too hard.

The Melbourne backs were starved of ball for most the second period.

After a series of penalties Tupton did cross the line for a deserved try.

Overall a useful win away from home with a team that had a couple of key players missing, but one that will have to be improved upon against Belper next week.

Try scorers for Melbourne, Andy Fulton, David Lowson, James (the power) Thornton 2, Peter Illot 2, Ashley Stringer, Nick Parkinson. One conversion by James Thornton, 3 by Dean Sylvester

After the game we were treated to a meal at the local pub and Parko won the meat raffle, he can be seen below accepting his prize, I am sure Mrs Parkinson will be pleased to see his bumper portion of meat when he gets home !!

The 2nd team had to be canceled when Matlock could not raise a team, a shame as Melbourne had a strong 2nd team available.