Coach Nelson’s double delight

MARK Nelson says that securing two wins in two weeks for his Rossendale RUFC side over Northern Premier rivals Billingham was hugely satisfying.

A series of postponements earlier in Rossendale’s season led to the scheduling abnormality, but Nelson’s men were able to see off the North Eastern side twice in a row to leapfrog them into fifth in the table.

Head coach Nelson says that the victories were highly significant for his squad: “It was very important. We’ve said we wanted to finish the season as well as possible.

“They’ve been directly above is in the table and as circumstances would have it we had them away and home in consecutive weeks. It was good to get ten points out of those games, and they only got two. We caught up quite a lot of ground on them.

“They’re a strong side and they’ve had some very good results and performances this season. They were devastated after the game because they thought they were going to put one over on us.

He added: “For me, it was the way that we managed the actual game, the weather, and the circumstances. There were a lot of factors involved in the weekend’s game that made it even more satisfying.”

Rossendale ran out 26-17 winners on Saturday thanks largely to the forwards, but were run a lot closer the week before, edging out their opponents by a point in the closing minutes.

The variation in his side’s two performances impressed Nelson: “It was the last kick of the game, a penalty by Lewis Allen that sneaked us the first win, and that was in quite difficult conditions.

“That was on an all weather pitch, whereas obviously Saturday’s game was at our pitch, so we beat them in a variety of conditions. For me that showed a maturity in the team to adapt to different conditions well.”