Sedgley Park 39 Wharfedale 8

WHARFEDALE'S loyal band of travelling supporters who swelled the home crowd witnessed another National League Two North defeat for their team.

The visitors started well and put the home side under pressure from the kick off. Park were forced to concede a line-out which Wharfedale won cleanly.

The ball was moved quickly with some smart passing until Park conceded a penalty which Tom Barrett slotted over for a 3-0 lead.

Third-placed Park Sedgley hit back with pressure from the forwards which created space on the left for Matthew Riley to touch down.

The next 15 minutes were closely fought with one very promising move by Dale from Robbie Davidson, Joe Altham and Tom Whyte just running out of steam.

Tries from Mark Goodman – converted by Riley – and Tom Bedlow gave the home side a 17-3 lead at half-time.

Park ran in three more unconverted tries by Richard Lepori, Callum McShane and Sam Lowthion in the second half before Dale scored again. Josh Prell got one score back for Dale but the scoring was finished by Park with substitute Sam Peet bursting through.

Tom Riley added the conversion to give the hosts a thumping and thoroughly deserved 39-8 victory.

The statistics are interesting and show that Dale were the architects of their own downfall. They had possession of the ball 30 times during the match compared with Sedgley Park’s 32.

So what happened to make the score so one sided with seven tries to one?

Park went through the phases and made Wharfedale work hard. The home side went through 120 phases compared to Dale’s 75.

Wharfedale did work hard and often turned the ball over only to see the it dropped or carelessly given away.

They generally had parity at the set piece although they did lose two scrums.The line-out work was very good from both sides.

The tackling still allowed the opposition to cross the whitewash seven times so there is more work to be done.

Crucially the North Manchester side were sharper in attack with their scrum half, stand off and centre running strongly all afternoon and making some of the Wharfedale attacks look a little insipid.

They worked well together looping round and creating space for others to exploit. The last try was a perfect example. Substitute, Sam Pett, may have run a good strong line to break through but the space was created by stand off Robert Holloway and centre Matt Riley.

Also of note was the Sedge defence. They pushed the offside line and were in the faces of the Dale attackers very quickly which meant they had no room in which to work.

They had also done their homework on Barrett and the kicking that was so effective against Scunthorpe in the previous game was met by well-placed defenders who then ran the ball back on many occasions. They then turned defence into attack. After the last few weeks this was a disappointing afternoon for the Green Machine.

Wharfedale: Hodgson (R Davidson 77); R Davidson (Prell 64), H Bullough, T Davidson, Cicognini; Barrett, Lawn (J Bullough 42); Altham (Bradshaw 68), Stockdale, Asejevs (Huck 49), Rhodes (Allen 68), Hedgley, Whyte, Wilson, Burridge (c)