8:17pm Wednesday 3rd February 2010
By Sportsdesk
Skipton were on their travels again – for the first time since early December.
Indeed, it was only their second game in almost two months.
Following the previous week’s home success against top-three team Castleford, the Skipton camp was full of optimism.
Skipton have not travelled too well this season but, against a team just one place above them in the league, hopes were high as Skipton were almost at full strength.
The team and supporters were greeted with some much-appreciated warm hos-pitality by Dinnington, and were hoping that the same vein would continue out on the field.
However, on leaving the clubhouse were met by a biting wind and a very hard playing surface!
Dinnington, on winning the toss, opted to play against the elements, which looked like it should be a 20-point advantage to Skipton in the first half.
Following the usual early testing out period of both packs, it seemed that Din-nington were a very forward-orientated team.
Skipton were soon on the offensive but, from a very promising position, were penalised, thus relieving the Dinnington line.
The first scoring chance of the game came in the ninth minute when Skipton were awarded a penalty 43 metres out.
Up stepped newcomer Jeremy Hargreaves for his first kick at goal.
He struck it sweetly, easily achieving the distance, only to see it rebound off the upright.
Skipton then conceded a series of silly penalties, resulting in play being carried out in the Skipton 22, but the pressure was relieved by a penalty of their own.
After 15 minutes, Skipton worked their way upfield and were awarded a scrum five yards from the Dinnington line.
As a result, Martin Murray, who was outstanding all day, picked up from the base and drove for the line.
He was stopped inches short, but scrum half Chris Wibberley snapped up the ball and scored under the posts.
This time Hargreaves made sure of the conversion to make the score 7-0 to Skip-ton.
After 18 minutes, Matthew Boatwright had to leave the field with a torn calf muscle and was replaced by Richard Willsher, who joined his brother Malcolm in the second row.
Dinnington then exerted some pressure and were awarded a penalty in the Skipton 22, but some foul play resulted in the penalty being reversed and the first yellow card shown, leaving Dinnington a man short.
Fortunately for Skipton, this was the trend of the first half, with Dinnington losing their discipline and con-ceding several penalties.
With the one-man advan-tage, Skipton were on the off-ensive and another penalty in the Dinnington half re-sulted in another three points, making it 10-0.
After 30 minutes, a sweep-ing move by Skipton pro-duced a great try-scoring opportunity, but somehow, with a two-man overlap, it was wasted.
Play was now all in the Din-nington half and there was more indiscipline from the home team, when another penalty was given and then a further ten yards for mouth-ing at the referee.
The quick-thinking Chris Wibberley took a quick tap to dart under the posts while Dinnington were still re-treating, taking the score to 17-0.
The last five minutes of the first half was all Skipton, and Dinnington had another man with ten minutes in the sin bin for a late tackle.
Skipton should have taken advantage of this period to put the match out of reach for the home side, but the score remained 17-0 at half-time.
In the second half, now with the elements in their favour, Dinnington seemed a different side.
Within four minutes of the restart, they successfully converted a penalty to make the score 17-3.
Skipton replaced the im-proving John Grayston with Luke Mellin in the front row to continue the trend of rotating the young props on a regular basis.
Dinnington continued as the attacking force and, with Matt Speres down injured, Skipton were effectively down to 14 men.
Speres subsequently had to leave the field with con-cussion, and Skipton had to use their last substitute in only the 55th minute, with Shaun Barraclough coming on to play an unaccustomed role in the scrum.
With the home side getting seemingly stronger and stronger, they soon scored out wide to make the score 17-8.
Skipton then had a rare chance of increasing their score with a fine break by captain Jonathan Richards, which alas came to nought. With Dinnington again down to 14 men from their third yellow card, Skipton should again have taken advantage but play was con-fined to midfield for the next ten minutes.
When back to 15 men, there was only the home side who looked like scoring and indeed they did, scoring a try in the 72nd minute to make the score 17-13.
With their tails up, Dinn-ington scored the winning try with the last move of the game, leaving the final score at 18-17 in favour of the home side.
This was a game Skipton should have wrapped up in the first half had they taken their opportunities while the elements were in their favour.
Skipton could be far higher up the league table had they not developed this annoying trait of losing games in the final few minutes!
Even in defeat, praise must go to some good performan-ces, particularly Martin Murray, who was outstand-ing, and a young front row who are improving week on week.
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