Wharfedale Foresters 56 Yarnbury 2nds 0

THE Foresters had lost to Yarnbury earlier in the season, so Rhys Davies’ pre-match talk focussed on making up for that result.

His team responded with another fine performance in testing conditions due the strong wind blowing down the field.

There was no score for the first quarter. Initially, much of the Wharfedale attacking play was constructed too far from the gain line.

It is to their credit that the side, with Jack Johnson again running the show well from fly-half, recognised this and became far more threatening.

The first score illustrated this. Johnson and Jordan Annett took the ball up to the Yarnbury defence, Harry Dunne picked a great line and stepped past the cover to score.

The conversion into the gale was missed – in fact kicking was to prove tricky with Johnson only landing three from ten.

To make up for his difficulties from the tee, Johnson ran in a hat-trick of tries before half-time.

His first two were both at the conclusion of several strong phases of running by backs and forwards.

Chris Swainson made several telling runs, as did fellow pack members, Simon Borrill and Tom Jackson.

Will Lawn, back at scrum-half, regularly broke round the fringes of the ruck and one such break resulted in Johnson’s first try.

Johnson’s third try came on the stroke of half-time when Johnson intercepted a speculative pass to run in from 40 yards to make it 24-0.

Wharfedale used all their bench in the second period and there was no let up for Yarnbury.

Ben Parkinson, enjoying a fine game from full-back, scored after a chip through. Shortly after, Callum Lockett, with almost his first touch, sped away from the back of a scrum to feed replacement scrum-half, Archie Hancock, who scampered in at the corner.

Harry Dunne grabbed his second try and caused problems for Yarnbury whenever he had the ball.

The back row dominated the ruck area, especially as Yarnbury tired, and it was from a turnover that Max Bell released Eddie Gill to score out wide. Bell himself claimed the next as Wharfedale ran the ball from deep.

The final score featured slick handling in the backs after Tom Whyte had stolen the a Yarnbury line-out. Jordan Annett running in under the posts with Johnson landing the easy conversion.