Aldwinians u14s 31pts - Ormskirk u14s 5pts
Travelling to the freezing wastes of Audenshaw with 5 of the first choice pack - and 8 players in total unavailable due to injury and sickness - was always going to be a tough challenge. The home side - bouyed on by some thumping victories and an enthusiastic crowd - started this Lancs Junior Challenge fixture at great pace. With a visibily bigger pack, Aldwinians tried to muscle the visitors out of the game, but to no avail as the Ormskirk pack played magnificently throughout the entire game.
With a fly half, whose first tactic was to kick, with a gale behind him and with a full back who must be one of the quickest backs in Lancashire, then there was going to be only one tactic from the home side.
The ploy of hoofing the ball up in the air for the full back to chase brought the home side their first try, although the grounding of the ball was very much in doubt, however no referee could have kept up with the flier. Ormskirk then gave away a penalty on their 22 - the offence being a mystery - a simple pop to a charging No.6 was too much and he powered his way through weak tackling to score.
Ormskirk came back well and pressed for their opening score, but a clearing kick was chased by the speedy full back who had the awareness to fly hack the ball into space and use his pace to score out wide, a great conversion followed. Another deep foray by Ormskirk was halted and Aldwinians broke down the blind side, for you-know-who to pop up on the wing and outsprint the defence to score under the posts for a converted try. Half time came at 24-0 and Ormskirk were looking a big defeat straight in the eye.
But, showing brilliant character they played the bulk of the second half in the home side’s territory. Breaks from Gavin Griffiths (three times thwarted by last ditch tackles) and Alex Morrell (who was stopped twice by the last tackler) allied to manful work by the pack to secure quick ball and enable Jonny Dunn to keep his backs moving kept Ormskirk on the front foot. Quick tap penalties kept the momentum up as the home side continually offended and even had their supporters on their backs. Ormskirk had to score and they duely did. From a quick tap penalty, Aidan Charlton made great yardage and fed to Marc Tasker who ploughed on, slipped to Joe Wright, who was brilliant throughout the game and must have covered every blade of grass on the pitch, he was stopped inches short, but great support from George Lightfoot saw him dive over to score a well deserved try.
To be fair to Aldwinians, they tackled brilliantly to continually thwart Ormskirk’s attempts to further reduce the deficit. It was rough justice that they scored under the posts in the last seconds following a blind side break from a scrum. Ormskirk never gave up and with only 17 fit players they showed excellent character and the home side agreed that the score bore no resemblance to how close this game really was.
Team: B. Watherston, M.Tasker, M.Sloyan, M.Bradbury (A.Charlton), M.Swords, S.Maloney, J.Wright, G.Lightfoot, J.Dunn, A.Kirk (C.Boylan,25), A.Morrell, C.Nicholson, G.Griffiths, J.Ford, D.Bailie
