On a very cold day we visited Pocklington full of expectations with a strong team on paper, facing a very young Pocklington side and York out weighing them up front. We commenced well with a scrum that proved our winning weapon, after some 5 minutes our No8 Harry Jinks, making his debut at this position controlled the ball well at the base for a pushover try converted by Joel Bradley. Almost immediately the Pocklington no9 got free to race over from 50 metres, the try was converted. Boz Borwell as always carrying well, broke the line to score for Joel Bradley to convert, almost the same happened again Pocklington responding to the score, replied immediately, as the Pocklington no9, jinked through our line out, untouched for a try, the conversion was missed. This was the wake up call, Rich Mackay coming on at 8, we needed his experience, he added two tries, either side of halftime, Will Norris finishing off a line out drive. HT Pocklington 12 York 24.

The only score from York in the second half, was a try for Rich Mackay, which was converted. With 10 minutes to go the replacement halfback for Pocklington raced 40 metres on a diagonal run unopposed.

We got the job done, but we were a long way off our best, some poor tackling especially close to the rucks, trying to force that last pass when we did not need to, we have to learn to be patient and accurate. Our work rate at the breakdown was poor, resulting in slow ball. Our opponents turned over our ball more times than they should have done, as well as holding us up to slow down our ball. Congratulations to a young opposition who played to the final whistle. I think we underestimated our opponents but the positives are we were good enough to do enough to win the game.

Final score Pocklington 2’s. 17. York 2’s 31