IRONMEN GIVE WHITEHAVEN A SCARE

SOUTH WALES IRONMEN .................... 10 WHITEHAVEN ............. 27

A RESILIENT South Wales Ironmen side gave Whitehaven a scare but in the end, the Cumbrians had enough in the tank to secure a win in the first league game of the season, writes Ian Golden.

Whitehaven took just 70 seconds to take the lead after winning a scrum on the half-way line, Steven Roper being given too much space to run the ball home and Paul Crook converting.

Roper combined with Crook for their second try of the game, which came on 24 minutes, one halfback opening up a gap for the other, with Crook making a clean break for the final 25 metres before converting himself.

The try came after a period of unsustainability for both sides as handling errors had ruled the game for 20 minutes before that. The 4G pitch ensured that the game was on, there was constant rain for an hour or two pre-game, but the wet surface hadn’t helped the players’ ballhandling skills, there were 17 scrums in the first half alone, 10 of which were awarded to Haven.

Ironmen had their chances to score before the interval, Connor Farrer was close, getting stopped centimetres from the line just after the half hour.

The away side were 12-0 up at the break and they quickly made it 24-0 after just eight second-half minutes.

First, Glenn Riley scrambled over the line and Crook added the extras, before Elliot Miller burst through the defence on the 40 metre line, setting up Jordan Burns for an impressive try that was well-converted by Crook.

Ironmen finally got on the scoresheet after Morgan Evans, on his first game back for the club after two seasons away, freed himself from the clutches of two Haven men to dart for the line. Paul Emanuelli added the extras.

It was all South Wales deserved as they’d begun to dominate proceedings, and this before anyone had been sent to the bin. Emanuelli had almost set up another try save for a good pick-up from James Newton.

Following Elliot Miller’s sinbinning for tripping, Ironmen immediately took advantage. Andy Gay was stopped short of the line before Yannic Parker went over in the corner. Emanuelli’s conversion attempt slipped wide.

Lewis Brown was next in the bin, but not before referee Greg Dolan had sinbinned the wrong person. James Tilley was understandably aggrieved to have seen yellow and following heated discussions with touch-judge James Jones, the error was corrected.

Ironmen pressed for another try and it was due to some more solid Haven defending that they didn’t score again. Jordan Burns’ try-saving tackle on his opposite number Parker was a potential match-winner.

Playing 11 v 13, Haven knew they just needed to play possession football to cling on to the game and they took late chances where it mattered to calm things down and cement the win. Crook kicked a penalty when given the right opportunity in front of goal then added a field goal for good measure to complete matters.