Otliensians beaten

MALTON AND NORTON 32

OTLIENSIANS were compelled to make a late change for this bottom-of-the-table clash with Malton.Tony Twist was ill and had to be replaced by Andy Rayner with Ian McCormack going on to the bench.

With both sides eager to do well despite being at the bottom of the table the game opened at a frantic pace with the forwards particularly rushing about and not really controlling the ball.

Otliensians received a boost after ten minutes when Malton were penalised way out on the right. David Smith struck home the penalty.

The lead was short lived as from a scrum in midfield Malton's stand-off cut in through the middle and with the rest of his backs in support it was a mere formality who scored the try. The conversion put them 7-3 up.

This was followed very quickly by another try and Otliensians reply was another Smith penalty. There was a converted try before half-time putting the visitors 19-6 ahead.

Otliensians opened the second-half in fine style with the forwards winning some good possession in the loose but in the set scrums were very much second best going backwards on almost every occasion to give Peter Gillson a difficult task at scrum-half.

He proved he was equal to the job scoring a brilliant individual try breaking away on half way and leaving several defenders trailing in his wake. Smith added the conversion to put Otliensians within touching distance.

Unfortunately a very soft try was conceded and with no cover at all . There was no conversion.

Otliensians' reply was an excellent try by Simon Coates converted by Smith. No sooner had they gone ahead than another break by the Malton backs produced a try to widen the margin again.

A try by Malton's scrum-half further widened the gap. This was followed by a penalty gopal to leave Otliensians with a mountain to climb although they did get a consolation try from David Smith which meant that the full-back had had a first rate afternoon converting two penalties and two tries as well as scoring a try himself for 15 points..

This was too late to have any influence on the result.

Bradford Salem 38

Otliensians 18

In the Aire-Wharfe Cup first round Otliensians showed six changes from Saturday. McCormack, Aldridge and Brett Tenniswood and Michael Wilson came into the pack and Matthew Tenniswood and Ian Chaplin into the backs.

Salem opened strongly and took the lead within five minutes with a try. A further try followed through a leaky defence followed by another which was converted to put Salem 17 -0 up.

Although Otliensians had chances, Chaplin failing to find the target with a couple of penalty attempts. He did however open the scoring for Otliensians with a penalty in front of the posts followed by another and an opportunist try by Matthew Tenniswood which Chaplin converted. This left a margin of four points at the break.

The promise in the last 20 minutes of the first-half was not maintained and Salem ran in two unconverted tries.

A further converted try emphasised Salem's superiority. Otliensians got a consolation try from Wilson.

Continuing the sorry saga of injuries Dave Roberts suffered a serious knee injury which will put him out for the remainder of the season.

On Saturday Otliensians entertain Otley Saracens in a local derby sponsored by Moboile Telecom of Harrogate and to coincide with this John Churchman has organised a members' get-together from 12.30 pm with food available.

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