On a day which lent itself to open rugby the early exchanges were dominated by a host of errors from both sides which prevented either team from registering on the scoreboard. The first team to do so was Manor taking a quick lineout just outside the Bury 22m area. With the home defence caught napping Manor put the ball through several pairs of hands before Stefan De Jong smashed his way over the line. The try was converted by Greg Anderson and Manor had a lead which they were never to relinquish. Things got worse for Bury as their winger made a mess of a regulation clearance and was then sin-binned for not releasing on the floor. Anderson converted the resulting penalty and Manor lead 0-10. Towards the end of the first half Bury came back into the match and during a promising passage of play for the home side they kicked in behind the Manor defence. Manor promptly gave away a penalty and the deficit was reduced to 3-10 at the break.

Early in the second half both teams traded penalties as the score moved to 6-13, but Manor’s dominance was starting to show and it wasn’t long before Manor’s forwards pressured Bury into giving away another penalty, which Anderson slotted taking the score to 6-16. Now 10 points ahead again, Manor moved up the field crossing the line in the corner with Reece Reed touching down. The conversion was missed, but at 6-21 Manor were in a comfortable position to see out the game. This however wasn’t to be the case as Bury scored 12 points in the last 8 minutes, capitalising on mistakes by the Manor backline to give them some hope of snatching an unlikely victory. It was however a bridge too far for the home side as Manor took a well deserved opening victory of the season.