Bere Alston United 1
St Stephen's Borough 3
BERE returned to league action after the cup win against Tavistock and played with none of the drive and commitment they had shown the previous week.
That is to take nothing away from St Stephens Borough who took the chances that were presented to them on a plate in what was a generally poor game.
Bere started quite brightly but were guilty of overplaying at the back and giving away possession cheaply.
There appeared to be no danger when from a Borough corner in the tenth minute Bere keeper Jack Dixon was beaten to the ball by Jamie Walton-Gould who nipped in to head home.
The visitors increased their lead five minutes later when more sloppy play from Bere was followed by a mad goalmouth scramble and Walton-Gould prodded the ball into the net from a yard out for his and Borough's second.
At this point the only thing worse than Bere's passing was the driving rain, but they managed to settle things down and go in at the break without conceding again.
Bere began the second half with more purpose, but apart from a low drive from Mike Curtis that was well saved, despite applying more pressure on the Borough goal they failed to create any worthwhile chances of note.
In keeping with the game itself, Bere managed to reduce the arrears amid another goalmouth scramble when a Nick Aplin corner eluded everyone and was rammed home at the far post by Will Westlake.
However, Bere's hopes of pressing for an equaliser were dashed when from a Borough breakaway Stuart Forte's low cross was sliced into his own net by Jason Clancy in calamitous fashion to effectively kill the game.
With no fixture next week, Bere must now wait until the home game against Wadebridge on November 6 to get their league campaign back on track and get themselves back into the top half of the table.