South Lancs & Cheshire Division 1
Sale F.C. 17 Oswestry 6
Sale had a comfortable win against the Shropshire visitors but it should have been by a much wider margin than the final result.
In the opening ten minutes it was all Oswestry as the visitors dominated field position and possession and went ahead with a penalty from Howell when Sale were penalised for going “over the top”.
Mike Raikes was just wide of the mark with a penalty attempt on 15 minutes but from the resulting drop out, Jack Moorhouse gathered possession and put in a fine break to keep us on the attack, until a knock on later in the move nullified the chance of points. The visitors responded well using their pack to good effect to gain territory but generally a combination of poor handling and wrong options limited the scoring opportunities.
Mid-way through the half with Sale pressing, an excellent dummy from Tom Holloway carved open the Oswestry defence as the scrum half touched down and Raikes added the conversion for a 7-3 lead. The visitors had a chance to narrow the gap to a single point but their penalty chance went well wide of the posts, and five minutes later John Blanchard touched down for Sale and with Raikes adding the extras we were 11 points clear.
Howell narrowed the gap back to eight points with a penalty on the stroke of half time but it looked as though we could gain a comfortable lead in the second half.
Sale opened brightly after the break and spent the first ten minutes in the opposition half but without adding to our score, and whilst we maintained pressure on the visitors, despite losing Llion Jones to the sin-bin, the points were just not coming.
Howell had a further chance to narrow the gap for “Os” from 40 metres but was wide of the mark, and the pattern of play continued with Sale dominating matters but coupled with a seeming inability to capitalise on possession. In the event, the only score of the second half was a Carwyn Williams penalty with the final kick of the game, to leave spectators satisfied with the win, but disappointed with the performance.
Neil Thallon