Bradford Salem fell to a record 86-7 defeat away at championship winners Scarborough but their pride was still in tact as they finished a creditable 8th with 54 points in a very competitive Regional 2 North East league.

With Salem effectively reaching safety with an excellent 26-10 victory over Selby at Shay Lane on 28th March, their principle objective was to fulfil the fixture over at Scarborough to avoid a 5 point deduction which would have dragged them back into a relegation battle.

With a mounting injury list and several key players making themselves unavailable, Salem somehow managed to cobble together 15 players to make the journey across to the East Coast who all deserve a great deal of praise for making the effort, particularly Second Teamers Jason Rolls, Tom Hopper, 44 year old scrum half Ian Woodwiss who was making his 236th First Team appearance and James Sinclair who was making his first!

Playing in front of a vociferous home crowd of around 500, it was always going to be a tough ask for Salem and in sunny but cold and blustery conditions at Silver Royd, they went 7-0 behind in the 4th minute.

However, there was cause for optimism when minutes later, Salem levelled matters when Byron Lisle, who ran and tackled his heart out all afternoon, raced over for a great try, Alfie Abbott landing a superb conversion kicking into the wind.

Salem spent the rest of the half defending and did well to restrict Scarborough to 2 further tries which took the hosts into a 17-7 lead but some poor decision-making by the visitors allowed Scarborough to score their fourth try on the the stroke of half-time to put them 22-7 in front at the break.

Unfortunately, the second half turned into a procession although Salem weren't helped by the fact that some of their 15 players were having to play through injury and exhaustion. To make matters worse, referee Graeme Hall showed no compassion at all and he did Salem no favours by sending Will Eastell to the bin for a dubious deliberate knock-on for which he also awarded a penalty try! Hall then reduced the visitors to 14 men for a second time when he harshly yellow carded Tom Cummins, playing in his last game for the club, for a technical offence!

In the end, Salem simply ran out of steam against a rampant and very good Scarborough side who ended the season in top spot, 15 points clear of their nearest rivals Pocklington.

After the game, Scarborough deservedly received the Regional 2 North East winners trophy from League Secretary Ian Scott-Brown in front of their many jubilant supporters. '