MALVERN'S fans are asking what has gone wrong at Spring Lane after this fourth Midlands One reverse on the run?

SPALDING 36pts, MALVERN 13pts

The answer would appear to lie in the back division, once Malvern's strength, which shipped tries to a Spalding side who look a rejuvenated outfit since their 35-0 reverse earlier in the season. With several regulars already unavailable, five late call-offs saw very much a second-string back division take the field against the Fenland side.

After a long coach trip, it seemed that the Malvern defence were mentally still on the bus as the home side ran in three converted tries in the first quarter of an hour.

Although the Malvern pack more than held its own, the Spalding team realised early on that Malvern were, as so often this season, vulnerable in midfield and exploited the weakness to the full. The home side added another try in the 25th minute before Malvern started playing with a bit more belief and a Richard Fleming penalty on the half-hour got them on the scoreboard.

Ben Hughes then made a dazzling run to set up a Dave Beech try and Fleming put over another penalty on the stroke of half time to pull Malvern back into contention.

For the first 20 minutes of the second half the Malvern pack dominated, Chris Smith impressive in the lineout and Andy Ridley making good yardage at number eight. However, the pivotal point came when a correct-looking Ridley try was disallowed and Spalding scored a breakaway try to stretch the lead, then sealed it off by carving through the poor Malvern defence for a final score.

David Robins, Malvern director of rugby, said: "We knew that we were going to be up against it, but when we had the late call offs on top of our injury list, then things looked bleaker. Our defence just wasn't up to Midlands One standard and we have to look seriously at encouraging some of the senior players currently enjoying the lack of pressure in the second XV to come back to the front line.

"This season was always going to be one of transition, and whilst we have blooded some promising youngsters, like Tom O'Brien and Mark Moaby today, we need to dog out the rest of the season with some winning performances.

"With the relegation positions in the leagues above likely to be filled mainly by Midlands sides, up to five could be relegated from our league, so I am looking for a target of six wins from our last nine games. We blew our chances of moving to safety over the holiday period, so it's now a case of all hands to the pumps."

Tomorrow (Saturday) Malvern play Hinckley at home, kick off 2.15pm, looking to avenge the 50-point hammering in Leicestershire last autumn.