North Ribblesdale 12 Ripon 25

NORTH Ribblesdale went down to Ripon who got a much-needed boost up the table leaving Ribb just one point away from the bottom two in Yorkshire Two, but having played one more match.

Ribb fell away late in the game to lose the bonus point and Ribb have a game this weekend against Wath, who are just above them in the table.

After a morning of torrential rain the weather cleared and, on a pitch that stood up to the conditions well, an entertaining game emerged.

After an initial period of Ribb pressure regularly punctuated by the referee's whistle, Ripon gained ground from two successive penalties and then got a third to put them 3-0 up after 10 minutes.

From the restart they got a foothold into the Ribb half and Clark and Graham combined in a neat move to put Taylor in under the posts for a 10-0 lead after 15 minutes.

Ribb then got back into the game using Ryan Sumner to penetrate close in with John Padley hoovering up the loose ball they had a dominant spell culminating in a converted try by Frankie Brown.

Ripon came back and, after a penalty put into the corner, Ripon mauled the ball to the Ribb line.

But the referee did not like the Ribb maul defence and awarded a penalty try which was converted to leave the scores at 17-12 at half-time.

Ribb did not look in a bad position,they were playing with the wind in their favoured position playing towards the clubhouse.

But in the second half they could not make any headway. The Ripon defence organised to nullify Ribb's most potent attacking weapon, Ryan Sumner, and their perpetual problem,wide defence, was exploited by Clark who dragged Ribb round the park with wide kicking.

Ribb held out at 17-12 until the last 10 minutes, they gave away a penalty but were attacking in the Ripon 22 when left wing Buckley got outside his man and made 50 metres in to the Ribb 22.

Their cover was not up to the job and after a quick ruck scored wide out on the left to finish at 25-12.