 |
| West began with
theslope in our favour and with a brisk breeze favouring
a punt into the bottom left hand corner. Locals reckoned
the slope was worth 14 points. But it was the home side who charged up the slope in the opening ten minutes, first getting the ball out wide and using an overlap to send in centre Paul Fraser, and then their forwards got in on the act to crash over. 10-0 down after ten minutes! But West came back with a rare try for us - a pushover in the corner with Brett Cullinane emerging to accept the congratulations. Stabs missed the conversion but, almost from the restart, he sent the ball out to Jamie Connolly just inside our half. He made a thirty metre burst with Kerr on his shoulder and, when the Kiwi was caught, he sent in the youngster who galloped under the posts. Stabs converted to give us a two point lead. |
| Sandal were showing all the indiscipline which marked the first half or our season and gave away yet another penalty on 18 minutes. This one was in Stabs's range and he gratefully accepted it. |  |
| On 22 minutes he took another after we had been camped out on their line. | This is how it was - Stabler's post match interview session |
| Darren
Thomas had broken from the base of a maul, and looked to
have got over, but referee Sawyer gave us the penalty
instead in front of the posts. We kept up the pressure but
some desperate tackling by the home forwards kept us at
bay. Stabler added another penalty on 26 minutes .....
but we still weren't 14 points in front! Sandal hooker Gary Swift was yellow carded for deliberately killing the ball and then on 31 minutes we got the try which extended our lead to 18 points. After more pressure down the left wing the forwards drove on. Thomas fed Stabler who made a break for the line and as he was tackled just short of the line he slipped an excellent ball to the charging Henry Tones. He touched down with great delight and Stabs converted to give us a half time lead of 28-10. The second half proved to be a much more dour affair. Sandal tried to use the slope and the wind but resolute West defence kept them at bay and only No 8 Vince Proctor looked a threat. He went over on 62 minutes for a try which was converted but we always looked comfortable. Any hope the home side had of catching us evaporated on 72 minutes when Proctor was sin-binned as we attacked and Stabs sealed our win with an easy penalty in front of the posts. West have played much better on their travels - Mowden, Nuneaton, Tynedale, Blaydon and Scunthorpe all spring to mind - but this was a solid well deserved win. We got a pushover try, nobody [including Chocky] got sin-binned and we didn't use any relacements! That's no reflection on the lads on the bench just a sign that we were always comfortable. Can we keep this form going and finish second bottom and County Cup winners. Let's have a go. |
|
| Sandal: Mark Wolff, David Ellis, Paul
Fraser, Ben Brindley, Adie Marshall, Phil Ure, Ian
Wolfenden, Brad Raison, Gary Swift, Darrell McSwinney,
Rob Dawson, Nick Hargrave, Jonathan Phillips, Tim Knapp,
Vince Proctor. Reps: Andy Wilson, Phil Grenhalgh, Andy
Key, Paul McIntosh. West: Phil Cuff, Elom Lassey, Gareth Kerr, Jamie Conolly, Tommy Barff, John Stabler, Darren Thomas, Michael Geritz, Brett Cullinane, Michael Cook, Chris Webb, Andrew Davies, Tim Sawyer, Henry Tones, Dan Wright. Reps: Paul Rudd, Mark Baggs, Carl Robinson Mark Cholmondeley |
|