By Matt Lawton
July 24 2003

Despite a tight opening, RMI were swept aside by their Third Division opponents, with a strong visiting Bury side running out comfortable 3-0 victors in a pre-season friendly match at Hilton Park. Despite the one-sided scoreline, not all the match was plain sailing for the visiting Third Division side who had to show plenty of resilience in the first half against an enthusiastic RMI side.

RMI actually had the better of the opening exchanges with the impressive Neil Robinson, a loan signing from Macclesfield Town, going close on several occasions, including an ambitious attempt at goal with an overhead kick. Leigh also had chances with local lad Andy Heald, playing at left back, whipping in some excellent crosses which caused problems in the Bury defence.

However, despite the early Leigh pressure, it was the visitors who took the lead when Gareth Seddon fired home from ten yards just past the half hour mark. Seddon's goal prompted the Railwaymen to lose a lot of their earlier shape and cohesion and inevitably Bury quickly followed up their first goal with another goal to extend their lead, with Simon Whalley tapping the ball home at the far post from only a couple of yards out.

This goal took a lot of the pace out of the game and although the earlier exchanges had been quite keenly fought, it then quickly took the form of a typical early pre-season encounter.

Bury were leading comfortably at half time by two goals to nil and after their promising early start, RMI then struggled to make many chances to attack the Bury goal and subsequently failed to get anything close to back into the game.

If the late exchanges of the first half were slow, then it was only a sign of things to come and the second half typified the reputation of pre-season games, with it being at quite a slow pace and with little action to speak of. The Shakers did go close and hit the post in an amazing goalmoat scramble which somehow RMI survived.

Bury sealed their victory with another goal with barely ten minutes left on the clock through lanky striker Chris Porter but it mattered little as RMI started their home pre-season campaign with nothing more than a whimper.

Porter nearly added a second to his tally a few minutes later but an audacious chip landed on top of the crossbar.

Leigh nearly pulled back a consolation as the game entered stoppage time when Neil Robinson had a shot cleared off the line by a defender with the goalkeeper beaten.

RMI will certainly have to improve before Saturday afternoon if they want to get anything of the game when they take on what is sure to be a strong Everton team, with the Premiership outfit set to send down a large number of first team players. However, it must be taken into consideration that the RMI side contained several players who are on trial, while on the whole it was a full strength Bury line-up where most players are used to playing alongside each other.