McTurk pops up with another hat-trick as Mowden ease home (From Darlington and Stockton Times)

McTurk pops up with another hat-trick as Mowden ease home

1:08pm Friday 8th March 2013 in Sport

Tim Wellock

DARLINGTON Mowden Park winger Chris McTurk scored his second hat-trick in successive weeks at The Northern Echo Arena in a 29-8 win against Caldy.

The former Scotland Under 20s player has shot up National Two North’s list of top tryscorers and is only two behind the leaders on 18.

Mowden face a hard task tomorrow at Otley, who are two places below them, while it will be even tougher for Darlington at Morley.

After losing 75-5 at home to North One Eastleaders Beverley last week, Darlington are 18 points adrift of safety with five games left.

Mowden continue to make a success of their move and, boosted by 200 at a Help The Heroes lunch, Saturday’s crowd was the highest in their division at 675.

After his good showing the previous week there was disappointment for ex-Barnard Castle centre Craig Dominick when he injured a hand in the warm-up.

TomHodgson waspromoted from the bench and opened the scoring with the first of his three penalties after two minutes, but Caldy went ahead when a good move was finished by their left winger.

Mowden lost Kiwi flanker Luke Wishnowsky early in the game with a hand injury, increasing doubts about his future with the club.

McTurk’s first try came when he seized on a handling error by the visitors. He cleverly drew the defence, chipped, chased and gathered the ball to race over.

Hodgson landed his second penalty when Caldy were deemed guilty of a deliberate knock-on and Mowden gradually stepped up the pressure.

From a line-out on the 22 a backs move saw McTurk burst through on an angled run for his second try, but Caldy hit back strongly and kicked a penalty tomake it16-8athalftime.

The visitors again came out strongly but were repelled by the resolutehome defence and after Mowden broke out a series of scrums ended with skipper Junior Fagalilo appearing in the back line to crash over.

Hodgson’s third penalty made it 24-8 and from the restart the ball was gathered by Mowden’s new full back, Leeds University student HenryRobinson, whodeftlyoffloadedtoMcTurk.The winger sped60metres to completehis hat-trick.

Darlington competed well up front againstBeverley, with lock Chris Anderson having a fine game. But they had little answer to the Pacific Islanders in the visiting backs.

Four converted tries were conceded in the first 23 minutes then Darlington held out for the rest of the first half before conceding twice more straight after the break. Prop Joe Cooke scored their consolation try.

Northallerton lost 45-10 after leading 10-0 at Aireborough, where a much-changed side was out-muscled by a bigger and stronger pack.

Flanker Rob Barnyard scoredafter fiveminutes when the forwards drove over from a line-out 15 metres out and all looked well when Dan Luck converted and added a drop goal.

But North then allowed the home pack to batter them and despite some excellent covering tackles from Rob Green, playing out of position in the centre rather than the back row, two converted tries were conceded in quick succession followed by a penalty.

Another try before half-time made it 24-10 and the Aireborough pack continued to dominate. North spent most of the half in their own 22 but managed to limit the home side to three converted tries.

The seconds put up a good show at home and were unlucky to lose 31-27 against York. North scored four tries in the first half from winger Des Fisher, second row Adam Massey, back row Dave Lawrence and centre Conner McCloud.

The usually reliable boot of Gareth Essex missed all conversions, restricting the halftime lead to 20-7.

York dominated the second half and exploited some weak tackling to take the lead with two converted tries before North regained some possession and scored a wellworked try following a break from Lawrence.

Johnny Logan was on hand to score under the posts and give Essex an easy conversion for a 27-21 lead.

From the restart York broke away and scored in the corner to cutthe gap to a single point.

In the last ten minutes York camped in the North half and made their pressure tell with some strong running from Northallerton player Clive Pointon, who stood in for York when their fly half was injured. He broke the line and off-loaded for the winning score.

• Yarm will face Felsted (Essex) in the final of the Daily Mail Schools Vase at Twickenham on March 23. A try by Newcastle Falcons winger Zach Kibirige - his 11th in this season’s competition - coupled with a mighty defensive effort, earned Yarm an 8-5 win over Plymouth College in the semifinal at Broadstreet. Despite having relatively little of the first half, Yarm led 3-0 at the break courtesy of a penalty by fly-half Will Guthrie. Plymouth dominated for long stretches of the second period and went ahead, but Kibirige’s try sealed victory ten minutes from time.