Keighley Cougars 22

Dewsbury Rams 6

The Cougars turned on their best performance for two seasons last night to end Dewsbury's undefeated Northern Ford Premiership run which started in June.

In scoring five tries to one they completely outplayed the league leaders, and the margin of victory could have been far greater if Martin Wood had landed three or four relatively easy goal attempts.

Other than that though Wood was outstanding alongside Jason Ramshaw.

Behind a dominant Cougar pack the pair of them ran the show, aided by Nathan Antonik and the increasingly impressive Steve Pickles.

Coach Karl Harrison was delighted, saying: "The lads were up for this game - they have been all week.

"We've worked really hard on cutting out the errors and defending the fringes and that really paid off. As well as scoring five tries this was a great team defensive performance against a very good side."

The Cougars got off to a great start, scoring in the second minute.

Dewsbury lost the ball on the 40m line, and after a couple of drives Keighley got the ball wide. A long ball from Wood put Richard Smith into space and his pass sent a jinking Jason Lee over the line.

But Dewsbury powered back, Matthew Long's inside pass sending poacher Nathan Graham over. Barry Eaton's conversion gave Dewsbury a lead they held for just seven minutes.

Harrison's brother Paul is another Cougar new boy gradually imposing himself, and he played a big part in setting up Keighley's second and fourth tries.

Paul Owen went close before the ball was sent out to Harrison. He looked to be over but stood in the tackle to find Antonik who dived under two despairing Rams tacklers to give Keighley an 8-6 lead.

Both teams tried their hardest to gain the ascendancy before half-time but Cougars turned round ahead.

Keighley caught Dewsbury cold on the restart. Ramshaw's long pass sent James Rushforth powering through two defenders and over the line.

If there was a key point in the game it came in the 55th minute with a superb try. Antonik held the ball up well to send Harrison through the gap. He found Pickles on the inside and he raced ten metres for the try which Wood converted.

Dewsbury never looked like pulling back a 12-point deficit, but they tried hard. Alex Godfrey went close a couple of times, and Graham did cross again only to be recalled for a forward pass.

Ramshaw tried a couple of drop goals that went just wide, but Keighley finally wrapped the game up with their fifth try. Wood pushed the ball out to Ian Hughes who was held on the line but found Smith who dived over out wide.

Karl Harrison could feel rightly proud of himself after this performance. The Cougars were unrecognisable to the team that rolled over so tamely at Featherstone.

The next two fixtures against Villeneuve and Doncaster look fascinating.

For Dewsbury the loss of Richard Agar in the 50th minute was a tough blow. They know if they are going to win the Premiership this season then they must compete up front. Keighley's pack were just too strong.

Keighley Cougars: Owen; Horne, Rushforth, R. Smith, Lee; Pickles, Antonik; Slicker, Ramshaw, Boothroyd, Harrison, Hughes, Wood. Replacements: (all used) Robinson, Hall, Stephenson, Thompson.

Dewsbury Rams: Graham; Godfrey, O'Meara, Potter, Flynn; Agar, Eaton; Long, Dyson, Hicks, Richardson, Kershaw, Ball.

Replacements: (all used) Baker, Talbot, Spink, Jowitt.

Attendance: 2,440.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.