Sandal 44 York 39 - 11th February 2023

Following a break of ten weeks without a home fixture Sandal again staged a thrilling finish against York with a try in the dying minutes to extend their winning run and remain unbeaten in 2023 with a 44-39 victory. Sandal had lost to York at Clifton Park in November by the odd point in stoppage time and so the result was particularly satisfying after an exciting but physical contest which produced some spectacular running rugby from both sides much appreciated by a sizeable crowd.
York made the early running and it didn’t take long for them to take up a position in the Sandal 22 from where a pushover try was scored and converted after nine minutes to take the lead 7-nil. Fortunately this lead was short lived with a move which started in Sandal’s 22 with a break by Jake Adams through Joey Allott passed to James Ellar on the wing who made some 50 metres before handing on to Luke Adams who finished off the move with a superbly engineered try near the posts. Brother Jake Adams converted to tie the score at 7-7. With twenty minutes on the clock Sandal was awarded a penalty to touch and from the resulting line-out their back line attacked with Joey Allott breaking through a weak defence to touch down and with the conversion kick missing its target the home side had taken a 12-7 lead. Following the resumption Sandal continued with their attacking game plan which gave Joey Allott another chance to score his second try in the corner but again the conversion was missed but the lead had been extended to 17-7. By now the Sandal backs were really showing their skills when James Ellar made an initial break before handing over to Jake Adams who out-paced the opposition to score a bonus point try in the corner. This time his conversion was successful and the score moved to 24-7 after 26 minutes. Sandal was producing rugby of the highest quality and three minutes later Will Henshaw was on hand to complete a superb passing movement and with Jake Adams converting the lead had progressed to 31-7 – an almost unassailable lead one might have thought. But York had other ideas and attacked the Sandal line with a successful maul, which was judged to have been brought down short of the line resulting in a York penalty try and a yellow card for Jimmy Stewart with the score moving to 36-14. With half-time approaching and from the resumption Sandal was awarded a penalty to touch into York’s 5 metre area. From the resulting line-out a maul was formed enabling Austen Thompson to force his way over for an unconverted try which was quickly followed by a similar York score to take the interval tally to 36-19 in Sandal’s favour.
An expectant home crowd was hoping for more of the same from Sandal but this did not happen with the game turning into a game of two different halves. From the second half kick-off a further yellow card was issued to Will Hodgkiss for a high tackle reducing the side to 13 players. Immediately York added a converted try to its score but this was soon countered with a Jake Adams penalty taking the score to 39-24. At this point Sandal was seen to lose control and York took advantage with three unconverted tries all scored wide out in the 49th, 54th and 64th minute to tie the score once again at 39-39. Doubts were now creeping in as to whether Sandal could create further winning chances which it did in the 75th minute when Tommy Allott broke free and gave Danny Groves the chance to throw a high looping pass to replacement winger Zak Burnside who caught a difficult ball and ran into space to coast over for a maiden try to give his side a winning score of 44-39. Sandal then managed to defend this score for some seven minutes to register another well-earned victory over a very competitive and robust York outfit.

Written by Howard Newton