Sunday 13th Sepember 2009
KING CROSS PARK U/16's 22 SKIRLAUGH U/16's 22
Yorkshire combination league match.
King Cross Park opened up their league campaign in the Yorks combination league with this home fixture against Humberside outfit Skirlaugh and after a fantastic first half performance they came exasparatingly close to ruining all of their earlier hard work almost losing the game in the final minutes of an astonishing defensive collapse, after racing to a 22-0 lead at one point.
The off-season decision to transfer into the more competetive combination league will be an interesting move and valuable experiences such as this game will stand the team in good stead for the future, but both teams must take credit for their skills, fitness and application to perform at such a high standard so early in the season.
The home side started very brightly with plenty of possession in the visitors' half of the field and on the last tackle of the set in the 3rd minute of the game, Alex Mellor chipped a neat kick into the in-goal area and despite plenty of attention he was unlucky not to ground the ball before it agonisingly bounced dead.
The visitors struggled to get out of their own half when in possession and it was no surprise when in the 5th minute a brilliant passing move from the right side stretched the defence and Ryan Crabtree received a well timed pass from Tom Johnstone to dive over in the left hand corner for the season's first score.
The game began to ebb & flo as the visitors found their form and attacked with more purpose, but the Park defence was outstanding, twice defending entire sets on their own line and managing to put pressure on their opponents when in good positions.
Alex Mellor was in great form and it was his defence splitting short pass to Will Milner which created the next try, Milner going over just to the left of the posts and Mellor then added the extras, to give a 10-0 lead on 20 mins. There was a steely determination about the home side and Jordan Batty in particular was very brave when cleaning up a testing grubber kick on his own line diving at the feet of an attacker to defuse a dangerous attack.
New-boy Emmerson Whittle slotted into the back row comfortably on his debut and remained hungry for work throughout the game to compliment the other two back rowers, Milner & Mellor. It was this combination who were involved in the next scoring opportunity a minute after the half time break with Milner making the crucial break and quick play the ball, Brad Traviss got a good early ball to Mellor who handed onto Whittle for him to crash over under the crossbar, Mellor again added the extras.Straight from the re-start, the visitors were stunned as Zak Dewhurst received the kick off and promptly went 70 metres to score, ripping through the broken defensive line and winning the foot-race to score under the posts, Mellor again converting. At 22-0, King Cross looked home and confindent with only 2 minutes of the second half gone, and Mellor made another incisive break shortly after, going down the blind side and Josh Hunt ghosted up beside him in support but the pass went astray as the full back was caught flat-footed, but the chance wasn't taken.
As the home side piled on the pressure at one end, they had to soak some up at their own end, with Tom Johnstone out jumping his opposite centre to claim a menacing cross field bomb and relieve the pressure, but this was only the start of Skirlaugh's comeback, with just 10 minutes remaining, Skirlaugh scored what amounted to the first of their four tries in a critical 9 minute onslaught and with the scores tied at 22-all the final try was scored too wide out for the conversion to worry the scoreboard.
With one minute remaining of this pulsating game the drama wasn't over as the home forwards retrieved the ball and drove deep into the heart of the Skirlaugh half and on the last tackle, Mellor scuffed a drop goal attempt at winning the game.
Both teams played very good in patches and it will be interesting to see how the season pans out if they improve on this very high standard of rugby league.
