Scarborough 25 North Ribblesdale 7

North Ribblesdale’s young squad made the long trek east shorn of too many regulars to mention but with a steely resolve to bring something home.

At the newly constructed grandiose £4 million home of Scarborough, with the wind howling in from the East, this was always going to be a challenging trip.

Ribb’s young guns began the game with the elements behind them on an immaculate playing surface.

The wind made handling moves treacherous for both sides, however poor kicking out of hand didn’t help the visitors’ cause and potential territorial advantage was spurned on numerous occasions with failed punts for touch. This allowed the dangerous Scarborough back three to run possession back with interest.

From one such foray strong running centre Rob James went over for an unconverted try after poor first up tackling allowed him to breach the Ribb defence.

Scarborough now seemed to realise their potency out wide and following more pressure veteran Kiwi out-half Marcus Edwards spun the ball wide to put in winger Craig Fairburn for a deserved 10-0 half-time lead.

This was after Ribb centre James Wallbank appeared to score a good try, which was disallowed, then, from the ensuing scrum flanker Chris Heap looked to have scored but was adjudged to have knocked on in the act of scoring Ribb began the second half playing into the elements desperate to get something from the game. Stalwarts Adam Stubbs, Mick Carr, and Graham Newhouse did their best to rally the troops but it was against the run of play that Scarborough scored another two unconverted tries through Nino Cutino and Phil Watson to give them a comfortable 20-0 lead going into the last quarter.

Ribblesdale rallied when lesser teams could have capitulated and following pressure on the home line skipper Dan Watson scored and William Davidson added an excellent conversion to put Ribb back in the game.

As they strove to gain a bonus point score, the ball came loose in midfield and following a rush to Ribb’s line, prop Jason Lowde was awarded a try despite not appearing to ground the ball.

With seven games left – five at home – Ribblesdale’s survival is in their own hands, and the team spirit demonstrated on Saturday needs to continue to ensure survival.