PETER Clegg has been involved with Otley for a long time, but he was hard pushed to remember a better defensive display from his team than the one which gave them a 17-14 victory at Wharfedale last Saturday in National League Two North.

"It was one of the best I have ever seen," said the Cross Greeners' director of rugby.

"We have been going to Wharfedale for years, and not many teams will win there."

What baffled him, however, was the penalty count, which was 21-6 in the Greens' favour and resulted in two yellow cards for the visitors.

He said: "That is beyond belief, but we did well to win in the end.

"In the first ten minutes we played some decent rugby and our winning try at the end from Henry Roberts was good too."

Otley hope to include full back Tom Hodson for the home match against Chester.

Meanwhile, mirroring Prime Minister John Major's theme at the 1993 Conservative Party conference in Blackpool, back to basics was the message from Wharfedale's head coach James Doherty after their disappointing defeat.

"Don't get me wrong, Otley thoroughly deserved their victory but it was because we weren't good enough," said Doherty as he put himself through the video nasty once again.

"Otley defended valiantly, but we got so many things simple things wrong - running straight and catching and passing and holding our depth in the backs, and executing line-outs and keeping the ball in contact among the forwards.

"We messed up five or six five-metre line-outs, and I mean messed up.

"Training this week has been very much about going back to basics and getting the fundamentals right.

"I can't even think about our trip to Luctonians on Saturday yet as we have so much of our own to put right."

A clearly frustrated Doherty added: "We missed seven tackles in the match, which sounds all right, but six of those missed tackles resulted in 14 points - two each in the act of scoring both of their tries and two more in the build up to their first try.

"Also we conceded five penalties and Otley conceded 16, but we couldn't take advantage of all our territory and possession, and you could not tell when Otley were down to 14 men.

"We just didn't make life difficult enough for them.

"We also missed our goal-kicker Tom Barrett. Robbie Davidson is a capable goal-kicker, but he obviously hasn't done it for a while and he was poor, missing two shots at goal."

Some spectators felt that the referee could have been harsher on Otley's repeated infringements in terms of yellow cards, but Doherty was having none of it, saying: "The referee was fine."

Wharfedale managed a penalty try, which these days doesn't have to be converted to warrant seven points, and a try for Jack Barnard which Davidson converted.

Another opportunity was snuffed out by what Doherty called "a great cover tackle" on winger Ben Parkinson by Alexander Beaumont.

But Doherty is not going to throw out the baby with the bathwater, saying: "We are not a bullish team but we are trying to play the right way and I am not going to change that."

Wharfedale bring in Archie Hancock at scrum half with skipper Phil Woodhead, moving to fly half for the trip to Luctonians.

Ian Larkin and Adam Howard return to semi-active duty on the bench, where they are joined by teenager Jack Johnson.

Wharfedale (at Luctonians): Robbie Davidson; Josh Prell, Harry Dunne, Ben Booth, Oli Cicognini; Philip Woodhead (captain), Archie Hancock; Joe Altham, Dan Stockdale, Reece Ward, Jim Mason, Simon Borrell, George Hedgley, Josh Burridge, James Tyson. Replacements: Ian Larkin, Steve Graham, Toms Asejevs, Adam Howard, Jack Johnson.