KIRKBY Lonsdale put seven tries past bottom club Morley in a challenging encounter at Underley Park.

Morley produced a determined performance and trailed by just one point at the break, but Kirkby broke out to win 50-17.

Kirkby kicked off towards the town, Morley obliged by knocking on skipper Tom Pickthall’s bouncing kick but Kirkby didn’t profit from the scrum or the field position and it was the visitors who had the better of the first quarter.

Morley looked nothing like a team propping up the division during the twenty minutes in which they had the better of the play, missed a kickable penalty but charged down a clearance kick on the Kirkby line to score a try through their back row player Ollie Flegg. The visiting skipper, Mark Chester, kicked the conversion and Morley led 7-0.

Kirkby got back into it through full back Ryan Terry, playing his last game for the club, who kicked a penalty. Dave Barton then flighted a kick for winger Harry Ralston who gathered brilliantly to skin the defence and score in the corner. There was no conversion but Kirkby had edged ahead at 8-7.

The lead was extended to 11-7 when Morley went offside and Terry slotted the penalty, but the visitors narrowed the gap to 11-10 with a penalty of their own.

Early in the second half, winger Ralston broke out of his own half down the right touchline leaving a couple of tacklers clutching air before slipping a pass inside to Scott Armstrong who ran in the try, converted by Terry to move Kirkby out to 18-10.

The lead was extended when a lineout was worked to Stu Storey who went over for another converted try.

Things soon got worse for Morley when they had a player shown the red card for his second high tackle offence of the match.

Terry kicked the penalty to make it 28-10 after thirteen minutes but both sides were down to fourteen moments later when Barton picked up a yellow for a technical offence during a Morley attack.

Despite being a man down, Kirkby scored the bonus point fourth try when centre Armstrong put in a strong penetrating run deep into the visitors territory, then getting the ball away in the tackle to full back Terry who scored to make it 33-10.

Morley then looked to have scored a try at the foot of a post but referee Peter Caunt ignored vociferous advice from the Morley skipper Chester and disallowed the try. The ref did award Morley a five metre scrum though and from this Chester got his own back when they worked a training ground move off the back of the scrum to put him in by the posts for their second try. The conversion narrowed the gap to 33-17.

There was to be no come back for the visitors though, although Kirkby did completely butcher a certain score when, with the line beckoning, they threw the scoring pass into touch.

Barton then restored order with a well worked but unconverted try by the right corner flag to give Kirkby a commanding lead of 38-17 with ten minutes of normal time remaining.

Armstrong was back in the action again as he ran out of defence down the right touchline breaking tackles and taking the ball deep into the Morley half before feeding Barton on his inside to score his second and Kirkby’s sixth try. Terry nailed the difficult conversion to make the score 45-17 as normal time ran out.

There was enough stoppage time for Armstrong to crown his excellent match with a solo effort from the Kirkby twenty two, an angled run towards the grandstand had the crowd on their feet as he drew the last defender before sprinting away for the seventh and closing try.