This Saturday saw Phoenix travel to face their sternest test to date against top half Hessle who have produced some competitive results. The side is now starting to maintain its consistency and this showed with them again bagging the points.
The only change was an enforced change with Poskitt suffering a hamstring injury on an outing with Doncaster 2’s with Harrison coming in to fill the gap.
Phoenix started off strongly and dominated in the pack with the forwards looking impressive both in the set and the loose and continued to show the dominance in the scrum shown against Vandals the week previous. The home side defence held up well and for the first ten minutes Phoenix dominated without penetrating.
The first score came courtesy of full back Gray when the backs received the ball thirty out and opted to run to space out on the left flank where Gray broke the gap and charged over to open the Phoenix account.
Phoenix maintained the momentum and it wasn’t long before they doubled the advantage. This came after the forwards gained field superiority and battered the right flank and from a ruck eight yards out Kaihau and his 20 stone frame picked the ball up with his mighty hand and barged through three men to touch down.
It was the home side who finished off the half on the front foot with Phoenix napping they applied some intensity in the visiting 22 and almost scored when they spun the ball right only for the winger to run out of room and hit touch when the line beckoned. With their best chance spurned the half ended in a 10-0 advantage in favour of the visitors.
On the turn Phoenix almost consolidated their position after the impressive Germaine broke up the middle to the right from the resulting breakdown Phoenix had the overlap to the left and Meadows failed to gather when a certain score would have put Phoenix in the driving seat. However, with field position gained Hessle infringed in front of the posts and Elliot slotted over the three points 13-0.
The best score of the day was saved till last with the rampant Phoenix pack doing the hard work the ball broke to Harrison who broke central and popped the ball to French who almost made the line but was hauled down a yard out – cometh the hour, cometh the man! – skipper and aging warhorse was on hand to receive the pop and dive over with fifteen left on the clock and replacement Stewart adding the extra two points.
For the next five minutes Hessle upped the pressure and camped on the visiting defence line and for four minutes the defensive line held firm. The visitors infringed on the scrum with the resulting free kick being popped blind for full back Collier to reduce the home side’s deficit by five points.
It was to no avail and Phoenix held firm and the bagged the points to maintain second place with leaders Otliensians going down to Airebrough confirming a three horse race at the top with Xmas beckoning.
Phoenix seconds also maintained their good run with a 31 –17 victory at Castle Park’s only game of the day and another two points in the merit table race. |
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