Rossington v Thirsk

Thirsk mens's senior team kicked off their season in the best possible way with an away win to Rossington Hornets in Yorkshire Division 5 after reversing the fixture due to unavailability of their home pitch,Thirsk started the stronger of the two sides and despite missing an early penalty they soon settled and despite the constant rain put together some good phases of rugby which after 15 minutes turned into points as Evan Sleeman faked to pass out wide deceiving the on rushing Rossington defence before straightening his run and hitting the gas to slip through the defence and leave the covering fullback sprawling before touching down under the posts for 5 points, with the conversion added by Alex Shepherd Thirsk settled and starved the home side of the ball for long periods of the first half with solid control at scrums despite being the lighter pack and dominant line out from a solid lifting platform of senior debutants Dan and Matt Mason making the step up from Senior Colts combined with the safe hands of Chad Scatchard,poor handling conditions restricted Thirsk to 1 try despite working some good openings but the homes sides inability to gain any possession kept Thirsk in the ascendence and allowed them to push their lead out to 10 as the home sides frustration turned into a penalty which Shepherd slotted comfortably from distance.
Rossington finished the half strongly but were restricted to the centre of the field by a strong back line defence headed by Danny Thompson and another one of Thirsk's home grown talent's Nathan Brown stepping up from the Colts.
With a full bench to chose from Thirsk freshened things up at the break in the backs and forwards they continued to keep the home side restricted to short spells in Thirsk's half with no reward as James Mann constantly threatened running kicked ball straight back up field from the wing. Shepherd slotted another penalty 10 minutes in for Thirsk moving their lead to 13 points, with the home side becoming more and more frustrated a small minority of their team started to look to intimidation rather than rugby to equal things up but Thirsk continued to play their rugby and stood firm together which only frustrating the home team more as they sensed a home defeat looming.with only minutes to go Rossington took advantage of a scrappy passage of play by Thirsk in their own 22 and pressed hard for points, Thirsk defended well but were guilty of not playing to the whistle after a blatant 2 metre knock-on off a hand in front of a Rossington players face as he tried to catch a panicked pass was missed by the referee and they reacted quickest to touch it down for one of their few opportunities of the game to get points,with the try converted the final whistle blow with the score 7-13. They say winning is a habit and the six colts in the squad who played in a team that were undefeated in the league last season certainly have that habit to pass on along with the heart to take the club forward