Recap

Match Report for Sale V Sheffield Tigers

With a score of 35-15 and a five point haul you’d think Sale would be overjoyed with their performance, but again we are a team with the ultimate aim of playing a full 80 minutes at our full potential.

This game initially promised to be a rip roaring ride with forwards and backs combining to score through Adam with only 2 minutes on the board.  Sale seemed to have learned their lesson from playing Sheffield earlier in the season where we allowed them to dictate the early part of the game and only really imposing ourselves in the final 20.

This time, Sale were looking to rack up the score early, however, in a blisteringly fast attack we managed to lose possession and chased Sheffield back down the pitch towards the clubhouse where they first earned a penalty from the breakdown to bring themselves their first 3 points, then not three minutes later we watched Sheffield cross the whitewash and all of a sudden from a glorious start we seemed to strive to make life difficult and we were 8-7 down after 13 minutes of play.

Fortunately, Sale started to dominate in scrums and more importantly at the line out and Andrew Hughes went over at the 24 minute mark which was followed by a couple of penalties within kickable distance.  For the second week running we did seem to get penalised quite regularly again.  I’m starting to wonder if either our players, or the officials aren’t all as brushed up on the Laws of the Game as well as they might be.  This game however, we were the side who managed to take advantage of the penalties awarded to us.  Liam marking his 101st game for Sale by slotting two penalties before the break to take us in 20-8 at halftime.

After the break Sale were playing towards the Steve Smith bar and started to pile on the pressure with Dan Birchall crossing the line to score and a simple conversion from Liam to take the score to 27-8.

Sheffield were now picking up injuries and some of their players were feeling the pressure, but they managed to strike back with 20 minutes to go and bring the score to 27-15, one more try and they’d bring themselves a losing bonus point and a bit of relief, however as with last week against Luctonians, we seem to get stronger as the game wears on and this week it was Adam’s turn to ensure the four try bonus point with time almost up.

This five point victory solidifies our position in the playoff position behind league leaders Caldy who also achieved a solid five points whereas third placed Stourbridge only managed a losing bonus point.

Man of the Match: Adam Aigbokhae

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