Breakaway tries from Matt Burke and Dave Walder edged Newcastle to victory in
their Guinness Premiership clash with Worcester at Kingston Park.
It was hardly a classic but the majority of the 8,864 crowd went home happy as
Newcastle extended their unbeaten run to six games and three in a row in the
Premiership.
James Brown missed a relatively easy early penalty before Burke belted over
one from over 55 metres to give Newcastle the lead in a lively opening 10
minutes, but the Falcons gave away a string of penalties at the line-out.
Twice the Falcons pack destroyed Worcester's scrum and referee Ashley Rowden's
decision to penalise Newcastle when the scrum went down was rightly treated with
derision by the crowd, as was his inability to see Worcester players on the
wrong side of the ball as Newcastle launched a wave of attacks.
Two real scoring chances were squandered when Burke's pass to Mathew Tait gave
the winger little chance of taking the ball and then Walder's crossfield kick
was just out of the reach of the chasing Joe Shaw.
Newcastle's line-out transgressions caught up with them when Owen Finegan was
sin-binned for pushing but the Falcons destroyed the Worcester rolling maul from
the line-out penalty and forced the Warriors to run it.
When Mike Maguire lost the ball, Burke hacked it 70 yards down field and was
there again when Thinus Delport could not gather and he snapped it up to dive
over and then converted from wide out.
Newcastle were caught stretched wide out when Thomas Lombard kicked through
and 'Aisea Havili scrambled between Burke and Tait to touch down for a try which
Brown converted from the touchline, but Burke made amends with his second
penalty just before half-time.
Newcastle lost two of their own line-outs early in the second half and
conceded a penalty which Brown kicked to make it 13-10.
But Worcester again lost the ball when it looked like they must score and
Walder snapped it up when Jonny Hylton could not hang on.
Walder raced 80 metres, shaking off tackles by Hylton, Delport and Simon
Whatling to score. He was hurt in the process and replaced by Toby Flood.
Burke missed the conversion but kicked a penalty when Tony Windo went over the
ball right in front of the posts but the Worcester captain made amends when he
was driven over for a try from a line-out, although the Falcons players were
adamant he had not touched down.
There was a nervous finish from both sides but Newcastle were able to run down
the clock in the last 10 minutes thanks to some fine tackling and kicking from
Burke and Flood.
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