South fire up a draw on Potteries trip

Despite being behind three times during the game, a battling South Leicester side out scored a rugged and robust Longton by three tries to two, in a game they could and should have won. In fact Glyn Devaney and Richard Lang were denied two more touchdowns by a dubious grounding and a very marginal forward pass.

The game started badly for South when within the first minute Longton stalwart Paul Green capitalized on a speculative kick and unpredictable bounce to go in under the posts. The same player added the extras.

South responded with a Gaz Jones bullocking run from the 22 metre line. Mark Lord was unable to add the conversion but added a monster penalty midway through the half for South to go into an 8-7 lead. Green added a penalty to Longton's tally which sent them into a 10-8 lead at half time.

Fired up by Mitch Read's uncompromising half time team talk South took the game to Longton, breaking out of defence and enabling Nick Griffin to beat the cover and go over in the right hand corner. The conversion unfortunately failed.

Longton came back into the game with another Green penalty, a Tom Hughes try which Green converted to take a 20 - 13 lead.

Despite playing against the slope, South began to maximise possession and some excellent work from the back row and break out running from debutant full back Rich Lang enabled South to be constantly probing for the equalizing score. It came in the 67th minute when fellow debutant, lock Jim Matthews, took full advantage of a gap in the Longton defence to go in under the posts. Mark Lord converted to tie the score at 20 all.

Longton had a chance to win the game in added time but Green pulled his attempt badly wide.

Although South were disappointed not to come away with the win, they should not be too disappointed as there were more positives than negatives in the performance.

On two previous visits to Longton since promotion to Midlands 1, South have come away with nothing so this result should be viewed as a bonus. Not many other clubs, if any, will come away from Trentham Fields this season with anything vaguely resembling such a positive outcome.

Onwards and Upwards!

South: Lang, Devaney (Martin rep.) Thomas, Ife, Griffin, Lord, McFedries, Bayley, Harris, Jones, Matthews, Hemsley (Sands rep.) Badham, March (capt), Bale.

Replacement: Green (DNP)

Scorers:
Tries: Gaz Jones, Nick Griffin, Jim Mathews.
Conversions: Mark Lord (1)
Penalties: Mark Lord (1)

Man of the Match: Richard Lang

Match report: Phil Lord