Yorkshire 3
Doncaster Phoenix 3 Castleford 10
This week Phoenix Park welcomed Castleford, who currently sit top of our league, but a tough encounter in Castleford, where Phoenix lost 25-18 will had surely been playing on their minds as they push for promotion.
Changes to the side included, the only professional player at Phoenix, Matt Smith coming into the blind side and Morris moving to hooker. In the backs Ben Miller got his first start of the year and Tom Elliot came into the side at the expense of Burton who was dropped from the squad entirely.
Phoenix knew that they would have to defend very hard to hold off the bulky Castleford pack and the rather rotund inside centre. Straight from the kick off Phoenix took it to Castleford, with Treacle smashing the receiver the instant he took the ball. Phoenix then defended extremely well throughout the match with the forwards missing very little around the rucks. After a couple of last ditch tackles by Phoenix to prevent a try, Castleford were bizarrely awarded a scrum for a knock on that they had made. From the scrum Castleford were able to break down the blind and eventually score in the corner. A well constructed try.
Unfortunately, Castleford managed to score within seconds of the restart. From the first breakdown the Castleford twelve managed to waddle his way past one of our props, who was covering the blind side, and offload to the winger to score in the corner. A well finished try by the winger who still had a lot to do after the twelve surprisingly passed it. At this point Phoenix stood under their posts and felt very hard done by and could not believe that they were ten points down. We had probably had most of the possession and had somehow managed to concede two tries. We knew we could beat Castleford.
The second half was all Phoenix, we dominated the lineout and started to put some pressure in the scrums, unfortunately we lacked composure in the final twenty two get over for a score. We did managed to earn a penalty under the post which got us within a score with ten minutes to go, but it didn’t come. The match finished 10-3 to Cass.
Mentions must go out to the impressive Miller who skinned the slow twelve numerous times to make some great breaks. A cracking performance by Mike Liddle saw him making a massive hit in the first half and gave the Cass prop plenty to think about in the scrums. In the back row Treacle tackled hard but didn’t get much chance to show his ball carrying ability and Veal turned over some good possession. It sounds weird to say, but a pleasing performance even though we lost. The side was full of determination and aggression which has not really been seen since Hullensians away. A bit more composure and trying to keep the penalty count down would benefit us greatly. Finally, Henry the month is January and we are in 2008.
Bring Cass on in the EDF Cup! |
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