Despite running in a total of 21 tries and 19 conversions in a 122-6 thumping of a game Peterlee Pumas, Underbank finished third in the NCL Division 3 table at the end of the regular season for the second consecutive year. Any flickering hopes of grabbing the second automatic promotion spot were disappointingly doused by their promotion rival Blackbrook comfortably seeing off Eastmoor Dragons. So it’s left to the play-offs for the Holmfirthers to secure promotion and they begin the task at home to Hindley next Saturday afternoon kicking off at 2-00pm. Rangers hammered Hindley 64-12 at the Cross Grounds in March on a fast track, but came a cropper in Wigan in thr return fixture losing 4-10 in late May in atrocious weather conditions.

Underbank were missing the influential forwards Andy Boothroyd, Matt Adam, Lee St Hilaire and Craig Williams, plus outside backs Corey Noel and Michael Lang from the bruising midweek draw at Featherstone Lions, but welcomed back Haydon Sutcliffe and Luke Karolczuk to the bench, and gave a season debut to Sam Hendrick.

In a totally one-sided, Rangers dominated from the first whistle against their less experienced opponents from the north east, and it took less than three minutes to register the first score as Dan Pawson raced over from a scrum move for the first of four tries for the flying winger. Neil Barrett converted and he was to add 19 conversions on the day. Player-coach Richard Knight was next to score on six minutes after Barrett and young prop forward Luke Nelmes created the opportunity. Rangers were playing some wonderful free flowing football and support play, and added further tries through Hendrick, Alex Chatterton, two Courtney Allette scores, plus a second and third for Pawson, the scoreboard ticked over consistently to show a 46-0 lead on 30 minutes. This was quickly increased to a half time lead of 64-0 with triesfor Sam Rochford, a fourth for Pawson, and Sutcliffe ending the first half.

Peterlee to their credit stuck to the task manfully and improved in the second period, but were still totally outgunned by the ruthless home side. Michael Murphy was the first to cross the stripe and Knight soon followed with his second. The scoring domination was then broken as Peterlee’s best on the day Carl Brown stormed over on 57 minutes and Lee Wheatley added the extras to narrow the margin to 76-6. This aberration stirred Underbank into action to add further tries in the final quarter through Karolczuk, a fine individual effort from Chatterton, James Usher, plus a third for Allette. Murphy then completed his double as did Hendrick and Rochford, and the scoring was completed by Karolczuk adding a second courtesy of a flat pass from Rochfrod from dummy half.

Centre Alex Chatterton took the Bengal Spice MOM award for some outstanding attacking play, and he was supported well by Karolczuk, Rochford, Barrett, Murphy and Hendrick.