Bradford Salem secured a wonderful 17-12 victory at Beverley in Counties One Yorkshire on Saturday, after 10 successive defeats there in a run that stretched back to December 1979.

Fielding a makeshift back-line with Tom Cummins playing in the unaccustomed position of inside centre, the Salem players performed magnificently even though they had to endure temperatures close to 30 degrees.

Salem have notoriously made bad starts on their visits to Beaver Park and they had an early let off when Beverley winger, Jake Boardman, saw his penalty attempt after four minutes drift wide of the uprights.

Salem took advantage of this reprieve and two superb tackles by flanker and man of the match, Morgan Mirzaali, who was outstanding throughout the contest, put the visitors on the front foot.

Good carries by veteran Sam Gardner and centre partner Cummins then got Salem deep into opposition territory and an excellent take by Dom Bailey in the line gave hooker James Brown the opportunity to power his way over from the ensuing catch and drive to give his side a 5-0 lead.

Although fly-half Andy Robinson was unable to land the conversion, he soon made amends when his huge clearance kick got Salem back to within striking distance.

After a punishing run by prop Conor Wood, the ball was moved wide and Robinson's cleverly disguised pass hit second rower, Oliver Leadbeater, who picked a great line as he sliced through a big hole to score a fine try to give the Bradford side a 10-0 lead with 16 minutes gone.

Two Boardman penalties reduced the deficit to 10-6 after half-an-hour but Boardman went from hero to villain when he received a yellow card for a deliberate knock on.

Moments later, it looked like Salem had taken immediate advantage of their extra man, but, unfortunately, referee David Rhodes was unsighted and therefore failed to see Cummins score what looked to be a perfectly good try.

However, the visitors were not to be denied, and, after another telling drive from a Bailey catch in the line, this time skipper and No.8, Christian Baines, muscled his way over for a try, improved by full-back Callum Smith to give them a 17-6 lead at the break.

Salem made a real hash of the second-half restart and immediately conceded a penalty.

That reduced the arrears to 17-9 and the gap would have narrowed further still had Boardman not missed two further attempts at goal.

Boardman was eventually back on target to get his side within a score at 17-12 and it needed a brilliant last-ditch tackle from Mirzaali to prevent the same player from scoring a breakaway try in the next passage of play.

With the penalty count going massively against them, Salem were under the cosh.

Despite all their efforts, it seemed almost inevitable that Beverley would steal a win when Ben Whitaker, who had put in a Herculean defensive effort, was sent to the sin-bin and was joined shortly afterwards by Baines.

However, Salem's remaining 13 players defended heroically in the final stages and somehow managed to close out a remarkable victory.

Elsewhere in Counties One Yorkshire, Keighley edged out Wetherby 14-10, while Bradford & Bingley continue to try and find their feet in the division, losing 52-14 at Wensleydale.

In the division below, Baildon defeated Huddersfield Laund Hill 23-18, and Cleckheaton sit bottom of the embryonic Regional One North East table after being beaten 51-29 at Pontefract.