PENNINE LEAGUE DIVISION 3

 

Whitehall Warriors   21

Littleborough          10

 

Littleborough came to the Warrior Dome with quite a big physical side but Whitehall’s Stuart Syme, Pete Williams and Richard Casanove rose to the challenge and repelled the initial ‘borough onslaught.

 

Alex Scargill and Chris Scrimshaw drove the ball downfield and powerful centre Rhys Brown couldn’t be contained and forced his way over wide out.   Ricky Middleton brilliantly converted.

 

Littleborough stand off took advantage of a Whitehall lapse in concentration, where they kept throwing away possession, and skipped through for a fine individual converted try to level the scores on half time.

 

Littleborough started the 2nd half with some strong running but Man of the Match, Richard Casanove, continued with more of his specialised body crunching tackling to sicken them off, and Captain Baz Stead’s probing kicks pinned ‘borough back on their own line.   Casanove, Williams and Marcus Gill chased one such kick and bundled the Littleborough wingman into touch.   Baz Stead capitalised on their hard work when he dummied his way over from the resulting scrum.   Unfortunately Middletons’s kick hit the post.

 

Scrum half, Paul Stead was organising his side superbly and when he combined with brother Baz they sent Rhys Brown speeding away on a fantastic diagonal run and his second try.   Middleton made no mistake with the conversion.

 

Littleborough weren’t finished yet and responded with a try of their own to keep their hopes alive.

 

Whitehall’s Paul Barraclough had an outstanding game at full back and cleared his own line numerous times to turn defence into attack.   Subs Martin Robinson, Josh Hopkinson and Simon Howland put in some telling runs and dynamo second rower, Andy Sadler, escaped the Littleborough clutches, and drew the full back to send Scrimshaw tearing away for a well deserved try.

 

Rhys Brown thought he had scored his hat trick only to be brought back for a forward pass and Gaz Simpson dropped a Barry Stead long pass with the line begging.

 

With only minutes remaining, Baz Stead slotted over a one pointer to end this match.

 

On Saturday Whitehall are away to Elland who play at the Greetland Community Centre.