SSE National League One

Coventry 53 Wharfedale 26

A MIXTURE of lacklustre play by some of the Wharfedale side, coupled with superb use of possession by Coventry, led to the Midlanders scoring six tries in the first half, Wharfedale's single effort giving a half-time score of 43-5.

The tries were scored by Gareth Turner, William Hurrell, Callum McBurnie, Thomas Poole, Dominic Lespierre and Matthew Paice, Clifford Hodgson converting five and adding a penalty. Taylor Prell scored the unconverted try for the visitors.

Wharfedale squandered what possession they had by a combination of handling errors and poor control at the line-out.

Add to this weak tackling, and the interval score was justified, and it looked like a very heavy defeat was on the cards.

However, the bench was brought on at half-time and this led to a resurgence in the visitors' fortunes.

Sarcastic comments from one or two of the home supporters were silenced as Dale started to play with more authority.

They dominated territory and possession throughout and brought the scores closer and gained a valuable bonus point for scoring four tries.

Tom Burridge scored first and then Scott Jordan added two, also landing three conversions to bring the score to a respectable 43-26.

Coventry answered with a penalty from Hodgson and, in the last move of the game, scored what one of the home supporter's called a consolation try with Daniel Rundle's solo effort being converted by Hodgson to make the final score 53-26.