23rd January 2010

Pontefract Pythons   15  -  Halifax Vikings   17

Man of the match - Luke Banfield

Scorers - tries Phil LIddle Patterson con Armstrong Pen D. Armstrong

Saturday 23 January 2010 Pontefract Pythons 15 Halifax Vikings 17 The Pythons may have lost this game but showed lots of guts, determination and an ever improving cohesive spirit against a team who not so long ago were in the national leagues and still have at least one ex professional in their ranks . The Pythons welcomed back Mick Wassel from injury and old boy Dave Wright both of whom had impressive games. They started strongly playing uphill and opened the scoring when Dave Armstrong who had a strong game at standoff put over a difficult penalty. In the opening exchanges the home side had plenty of ball and forced their opponents into to some desperate defence with Colin Swift , Dave Brown and John Trevorrow carrying the fight to Halifax up front. It was to be a game dominated by the forwards but whenever the ball got to the Pontefract backs they did look dangerous, especially in the hands of workhorse scrumhalf Luke Banfield or wingers Craig Liddle and John Stevenson . The Pythons stretched their lead when good drives from Rich Armstrong and Richard Liddle got them good field position and Phil liddle crashed over to score. After a period of sustained pressure from the visitors and despite plucky defence from Ashley Bradshaw and Simon Bickerdike Halifax scored a converted try and added a penalty to take an undeserved lead. After the break the Pythons introduced Liam Senior to the fray who provided a little more go forward and even steelier defence which rocked the Vikings further and after great pressure the Pythons regained the lead with the best try of the match. Luke Banfield made a scampering break and fed the supporting Armstrong whose deft inside ball allowed Charlie Patterson to score under the posts with Armstong himself adding the conversion. Pythons held onto this lead until two minutes from time despite constant pressure from Halifax. In the end a converted try stole the game but Pythons can hold their heads up high in running a team undefeated this year very close which bodes well for their upcoming league games. Luke Banfield took the man of the match award for his usual fearless display in both attack and defence but in truth any one of the team could have taken the award for their collective spirit.

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Report by Flatcapper