South Lancs & Cheshire Division 1
Sale F.C. 35 Ormskirk 22
Sale overcame a 10 point first half deficit and played the last quarter of this match a man short due to injury, but finally won an absorbing contest at Heywood Road.
Ormskirk had points on the board in the first minute with an Armstrong penalty, and extended their lead on 20 minutes when a kick ahead from inside their own half saw the O’s open side produce a second grubber kick and win the race to touchdown for a converted try and a 10-0 lead. Mike Raikes narrowed the gap with a penalty when the visitors were penalised for handling in the ruck, but on the half hour Armstrong restored Ormskirk’s 10 point lead with a second penalty.
With seven minutes of the half remaining Andrew Baston broke through the visitors defence to score under the posts and Raikes added the conversion to put us just three points in arrears. Sale were now exerting greater pressure and four minutes later a half break from Tom Holloway and a neat reverse pass found No. 8 Alex Bowen to finish the move and touch down for his first try for the club and with a second successful conversion from Raikes we were in front for the first time. Armstrong then kicked a third penalty for Ormskirk on the stroke of half time to narrow our lead at the break to just 17-16.
The second half started with little in the way of “cutting edge” rugby and Ormskirk went back in front with the accurate Armstrong adding another three-pointer before Sale once again sparked into life. With the hour mark approaching a solo break from Jack Moorhouse saw him brush off weak tackling for an unconverted try, and four minutes later a trademark Baston charge ended with another Sale try and Raikes added the extras for a 29-19 lead.
Armstrong narrowed the Ormskirk deficit to seven points with his fifth penalty of the afternoon with a quarter of an hous remaining, and almost immediately afterwards we were reduced to 14 men with the loss of John Blanchard through injury after using all our substitutes.
Mike Raikes kicked two further penalties in the closing minutes but despite us being one short, the visitors could not impose serious pressure on the Sale line and we ended with a satisfactory victory.
Neil Thallon