Harrogate 19 Doncaster 21
Doncaster 2nd XV suddenly became Doncaster 2nd XIV for our trip to Harrogate, through injuries, holidays and late cry off's. Although the mood in the changing room was some what subdued at the prospect of playing with 14 men at Harrogate, it soon changed to a positive mood of defiance once the warm up started. Matt Emmerson has done a tremendous job in building a real team spirit, in such a short time. A major contributory factor is the commitment of the first team players who play with the second team each week and this week was no exception with leading roles being played by Ryan Peacy and Dan Storey. Not to mention the driving qualities of Simon Greenslade, who leads this very young side as both Captain and mentor. Everybody in the team and on the touchlines looks to Simon's leadership and he never fails to deliver.
As expected Harrogate started with a flurry of pacey attacks through both the forwards and backs and after only five minutes they scored in the corner from a flowing move through their three quarters. A missed conversion saw them 5 - 0 up and rubbing their hands at the thought of running in a cricket score, but their celebrations were a little premature. Once the Doncaster pack started to operate, the game took on a different look and Doncaster began to dominate, with the pack nudging upfield and opening up play for the three quarters. It was on one such occasion that Simon Greenslade slotted a clever little grubber kick through the flat defence and Stevie Mayer with lightning speed chased the ball down to get the first hand to the ball for what everybody thought was a perfectly good try, only for the referee to judge that the ball had been touched down by the Harrogate full back. Doncaster had a sustained period of attack in the same vein and again Ryan Roodt crossed the line in the corner only for it to be judged as a double movement and still no score. Harrogate were now giving away penalties to try and stem the tide and Townsley stepped up and bagged three penalties to give Doncaster a 9 - 5 lead approaching half time. In what seemed to be an endless stint of injury time for the first half Harrogate were mounting a sustained assault on the Doncaster line and despite some heroic defending the Harrogate pack trundled over to score a converted try to give then a 12 - 9 lead at the break. We were a little bit disappointed at the score but again the troops were rallied at half time and ready to take on the 15.
The second half went pretty much the same way as the first half, with the Doncaster pack nudging Harrogate back in to the bottom corner and the three quarters running at the Harrogate defence at every opportunity. It was from such an attack and some slick ball handling and inter play between Greenslade, Townsley, Ryan Roodt and Dan Storey that resulted in the first score of the second half, when Storey crossed the line after 10 mins, Townsley narrowly missing the conversion to give Doncaster a 14 - 12 lead. The game continued in the same pattern and following a clearance kick to touch by the Harrogate, a quick throw in saw the ball fly out to Stevie Mayer just outside his own 22 and with blistering pace he sliced through the ragged Harrogate defence like a hot knife through butter, to score under the posts, Townsley added the 2 points and Harrogate were stunned to find themselves 12 -21 down to 14 men. The last 20 minutes was fast and furious and with the heroes from Doncaster tiring, Harrogate mounted a sustained assault on the Doncaster line, but were repelled time and again by tremendous defence. With 5 minutes to go the referee judged Ryan Peacy to have deliberately handled the ball in the ruck and dismissed him to the Sin Bin. Now down to the 13 men the overlap became too great for even these heroes to cope with and Harrogate eventually went over for their third try. The conversion put a little more pressure on and the final whistle could not come soon enough, with Doncaster running out 19 - 21 winners. Well done to all the lads - a great job done. |
