New Brighton 34, Liverpool St Helens 12

LSH travelled to the Wirral with high hopes of lowering the home team's colours but were unable to disrupt a well organised New Brighton team.

The early exchanges were keenly contested but New Brighton used their superiority in the scrum to good advantage and this, coupled with intelligent use of the wind, began to give them the upper hand.

The LSH tackling was initially good, with Jones, Bibby and Liddle leading the way, but just as the home team appeared to be getting frustrated, a quickly taken tap penalty caught the visitors cold and New Brighton crossed at the posts for a converted try. Undaunted, LSH took the game to their opponents and use of a mixture of line-outs caused New Brighton some problems but there was tendency to rush matters and this brought handling errors which in turn caused promising situations to come to nothing. The home team flankers had outstanding games, and they often won quality re-cycled possession, and strong drives from their pack created spaces which the New Brighton backs exploited, crossing for two converted tries, and these, together with a penalty goal, brought them a 24-nil half-time lead.

The introduction of D Gaskell at half-time brought fresh impetus to the LSH cause and for the early part of the second half they enjoyed the territorial advantage but they were unable to turn this into points, and as the home team weathered the storm they in turn moved upfield and scored two unconverted tries.

With 20 minutes left LSH were facing a heavy defeat but yet again they closed ranks, tightened their defence, and showed their excellent team spirit.

N Simms made an excellent break from his own half and when this was continued by the forwards they were unlucky not to score, but this increased confidence and after a strong run by Gaskell, Simms was able to cross at the posts for a try, converted by Cumming.

The fitness of the LSH team was now beginning to show and for the last 10 minutes it was they who were camped on the line. They were awarded a number of tap penalties and finally Carter scored a late try.

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