Game plan comes good as Tarleton jump over Hoppers

AFTER last week’s surprise defeat against Southport, Tarleton Seconds knew that an away victory against Preston Grasshoppers was essential.

Hoppers had posted a reasonable run of results and Tarleton were going to have to take their chances when created this week.

A good squad was assembled and in cold wet conditions the game got underway.

From the start the game was scrappy with both sides being penalised far too many times.

Hoppers’ full-back took an early opportunity to take the lead with a penalty that was well struck.

Tarleton came straight back at them from the re-start and they were also awarded a penalty in front of the posts but opted for a scrum instead of the three points.

From the scrum they made a few yards and as the Hoppers defence retreated the ball was spun out to the on-rushing Dave King who went over to score, the conversion hit the upright and Tarleton led 5-3.

The rest of the half was a catalogue of penalties to both sides, three of which were scored by Hoppers and two by Tarleton which left the score at 12-11 to Hoppers with a few minutes of the half remaining.

The final score of the first half came from yet another penalty which Tarleton kicked to the corner.

From the line-out a maul was formed and good ground was made before the ball again found its way out to Dave King who went in for his second try of the day and at the half time whistle Tarleton led 16-12.

Early in the second half Tarleton lost a player to the sin-bin and Hoppers used this to their advantage and a push over try which was converted saw them regain the lead at 19-16.

Tarleton were awarded another penalty following an off the ball incident and Dan Mallinson calmly slotted the ball over to put the game level at 19-19.

Tarleton then took control of the game, back up to full strength they started to run everything at Hoppers and a great run by Luke Banks saw him score a good individual try which Mallinson converted and Tarleton now led 26-19.

However, they allowed Hoppers back into the game by giving away another needless penalty in front of the posts that the Hoppers full-back converted and the lead was now only 26-22.

With 20 minutes to go the Tarleton game plan started to work as the Hoppers defence started to tire and gaps appeared that were exploited by Tarletons’ runners.

Two promising breaks were stopped illegally in quick succession and both penalties were slotted by Mallinson to extend Tarleton’s lead to 32-22.

The game was then finished off as both Tom Wignall and Ben Walton scored tries following good interplay between the forwards and backs.