Two second-half tries proved decisive at Mitcham came out on top in a drab derby at Poulters Park.

The visitors started brightly with Chuck Sander and Tim Rossiter leading the charge, but James Rice’s penalty drifted wide.

Then Danny Trick made a couple of storming runs, but Mitcham were defending well and restricted Merton to just one further penalty attempt, which Rice again put wide.

With no score at half-time, both sides were in with a shout, but the stalemate ended when Mitcham forced their way over in the corner.

To make matters worse for Merton, Rice took a blow to his head in trying to prevent the try and left the field with a bloody nose to be replaced by James Newark.

Craig Gigg, back from a broken thumb, came on for Sanger, and Merton began to make their way into home territory, Alex Gordon-Walker having a couple of good runs in midfield.

Unfortunately, the final pass was failing to go to hand and they just could not get over the whitewash and continued to fail to trouble the scorers.

To add insult to injury, the hosts then broke into the Merton half and created an overlap wide on the left, scoring a vital converted try that gave the visitors a mountain to climb.

Although they came back with some incisive running, from Ed Lovatt in particular, they could not make the final couple of metres to get over the home line. When the final whistle blew, Merton knew that they had missed a great opportunity to record another League victory.

This Saturday, Merton travel to play Worth Old Boys in a return League fixture. Coach Kieran Blogg hopes to have a few players back and available for selection, but knows that he is without Nick Ramsey, Tim Rossiter and Chris Corby.

New players, of all standards, are welcome to attend training on Wednesday evenings at 7.30pm, under floodlights, at Morden Recreation Ground, Faversham Road, Morden. For more information, call Jack on 07970 166958.