WELCOME Today it is a pleasure to welcome Selby to Acklam Park, and truth be told it is a pleasure to see some rugby again! To date our visitors league programme has been a little unpredictable. They started the season as they finished the last one, when a final flourish amassed them 30 points from six victories to move clear of relegation. This season they won four of their opening eight league games for a satisfactory beginning to the campaign, but then things started to go awry. After beating Guisborough at the end of October they lost nine consecutive matches, not winning again until last time out at home to Keighley at the end of January, when a penalty try in the final moments earned them a crucial 24-20 much-needed victory. We beat Selby 38-10 in the game immediately before their Guisborough success, a victory I hope we can repeat this afternoon to get our own season back on track.

BORO RUGBY We volunteered to remain in Yorkshire 1 this season because the overall standard and quality of rugby is higher and better than in DN1. Nowhere was this better illustrated than the last time we gathered here to to welcome O Crossleyans. Both teams scored two tries. Our first, scored by Jack McPhillips and converted by Matty Todd, gave us the lead and our second, finished by young Harry Bryce, cemented our 21-13 win. In between three penalties were converted by Matty and one by Crocs, who also scored two breakaway tries. At half time the score was 10-3 before Crocs levelled the match at 13-13. Another Toddy penalty set up a nail-biting finale, but having been walloped 45-19 at Crocs in September, we had something to prove; we intensified the pressure, and were unlucky to score only one more try. There were good performances aplenty, but I must applaud Toddy. In only his second game back after his long lay-off his place kicking was superb and he was instrumental in both tries. First he placed an astute grubber kick behind Crocs defence for Jack to muscle his way over, and then at the end when our forwards were attacking the Crocs line to the right of the posts Matty, standing to the left of the ruck, swooped across to his right and took a lovely back-pass from Chris McRoberts, shipped the ball to Andy Mick who flipped it to Harry – game over.

At Keighley injuries to key players resulted in some lads stepping up from the second team. The game ebbed and flowed much of the time. A charge down gifted the hosts a 5-0 lead and then Boro mistakes saw them score twice more to make it 19-0. Back we came with a great try from Harry Bryce, converted by Toddy. Both sides exchanged penalty kicks making it 22-10 then with the last play of the match we were pushing for a losing bonus point when a pass was intercepted by the home winger who raced under the posts from 50m, making the final score 29-10. I must make special mention for the young players, Jamie Watson, Jake Schofield and Elliott Ward all of whom had good games along with regular young 'uns Brendan Hill, Harry Bryce, Kieran Clark and Sean Jarvis. We certainly have some talent coming through the ranks. And well done to Matthew Todd, chosen by the opposition as Man of the Match.

Eight of the Wasps last ten games have been away, a trend which should be broken today as Westoe are due to visit us. There are reports by Jonno in this issue on their last four trips, to Ryton, Pontefract, Percy Park and, in the CANDY Cup, to Novocastrians.

Finally, on 19 January, the 'A' team got their first game since 8 December after a few teams called off. They travelled to Wensleydale, arriving 20 minutes before their hosts, but then fell behind to an early try from the kick off before some dominant scrummaging led to a drive over for Dan Houchen. The game was evenly balanced, but another mistake let Dale score again, but Scotty Milburn gave the ball to Wes to pass to JP to score in the corner. A Dale penalty and another crunching carry for Scotty resulting in a Matty Watts try made it 15-15 at the break. Our boys then took the lead for the first time when Eric 'Yorkshire' powered his way under the posts for Sam to convert. Another Dale penalty made the final 10 minutes extremely tight, but with the last play of the game Jonny Blackburn stole the ball and Captain Tom scored in the corner, Final score 18-27 to the 'A' team, Dale proved to be the hardest and most physical opponents they've played this season. MoM was Scotty Milburn, whilst JP was DoD.

When our Colts scheduled opponents Pocklington cried off (at home), Tom picked up a fixture at Houghton, a game our boys won 14-22. Playing with the wind and rain our opponents took a first half lead of 14-0, but a brace of second half tries for Will Seymour and one each for Will Deeks and Abe Crosby sealed the victory.

CLUB NEWS Many congratulations to Jacob Unwin on being selected for England Deaf at such a tender age (see separate report) and also to Kieran Clark, who is co-captain of Durham U20s this season; they play Staffordshire at Billingham tomorrow. And what a fantastic Burn's Supper we enjoyed last week. It was another fantastic feast of Scottish fayre prepared as ever by the Collingwoods, Linda and her sous chef Ian with a little help from son George. A full house rocked with laughter at the unique musical toast 'To the Lassies' from Dave Waddington and the equally amusing reply during the toast 'To the Laddies' from his wife Ann. It was interesting to hear that crawling into bed in the early hours after 'the game' the one thing on Dave's mind was explaining to Ann in intricate detail how he scored 'the best try ever.' I offer them all a huge 'THANK YOU' along with Colin and Tilly for all their efforts in arranging such a thoroughly enjoyable evening.

Good news! It's great to see Carl Kirwan has battled his way back from two years of injury misery to resume his career. An obvious star as he graduated through our Juniors into the 1st XV he would surely have added to his England honours but for his wretched shoulder. Having resumed for Worcester against Pau in December he is now gaining more play time on loan at Ealing. We wish him a speedy return to full fitness and the Premiership,

REFEREE'S CORNER This afternoon I am delighted to welcome Tom Howard, a first time visitor to Acklam Park. Tom has been refereeing for ten years, before which he played for West Park Leeds. He is a contract manager in the automobile industry. I hope he enjoys this visit and his time with us this afternoon.

WHO DOESN'T LIKE A PARK PIE!
Just feast your eyes! As the great and the good gathered at Acklam Park for our 8th Annual Pie Baking Contest this is just a selection of the pies which greeted them. Once the judging and presentations were over the much-anticipated highlight of the evening was the opportunity to sample the scrumptious fayre, accompanied as ever by the mushy peas provided by our ever-supportive Admiral Collingwood. Of course the real beneficiaries of the evening are our Juniors. Sale of the pie suppers, together with the raffle, raised almost £200 for Junior funds. A huge THANK YOU to everyone who supported this event, and to organiser-in-chief Mark 'Narnah' Jones, shown here with the winner Neil 'Little Dicco' Dixon, his third success in the contest; as a result he's off to Tenerife next month for the All Europe finals.