This delayed second round Yorkshire Shield game was played under lights on a sticky Heath pitch and brought a well deserved victory for a Selby Team using the opportunity to give some of the first team fringe players valuable game time. With skipper Rob Taylor taking a rest, Matthew Smith was delighted to record his first ever win as Selby skipper and was influential in much of Selby’s attacking momentum.

All in all, whilst it is fair to reflect that the home side shaded possession from the line-out, the Selby set scrum was dominant throughout the game and this aspect was probably one of the crucial factors in the game, along with the incisive running and intuitive support of the Selby backs.

The first half was lively but brought few clear cut scoring chances with Selby shading the scoring 6-3 thanks to 2 penalties from the boot of Dan Porter. One stand out moment from the first half saw Matthew Smith make a darting break down the blind and find Ben Lunt on a perfectly timed switch. When the livewire winger chipped ahead he was favourite to win the race to the ball but was clinically fouled, high and off the ball by the covering Heath winger who can count himself extremely fortunate that he was not yellow carded for his cynical challenge. Unfortunately for Selby the resultant penalty was unsuccessful as Dan Porter totally lost his footing in his kicking stride and the Heath transgression remained unpunished.

Within the first 20 minutes of the re-start Selby produced a couple of sublime moments of Rugby which opened up a 17 point lead and put the game out of reach of the home side. Instrumental in both plays were Russ Dovey, who started the game looking uncomfortable at having been asked at the last moment to stand in at 10 but who grew in confidence with the ball in hand, and Alex Webster whose pace and intuition brought him both scores. The first try involved a clever switch with Ben Lunt who burst the defensive line and chose exactly the right moment to offload to the alert Webster who gave Dan Porter the easiest of kicks by running under the posts.

It was a blow to Selby that Dan was forced to leave the pitch with a hamstring pull midway through the half, but within a minute of his departure a clever run in midfield by Russ Dovey opened up the Heath defence again and Alex Webster was quickly on his shoulder to finish off another excellent move for a try converted by Ben Lunt.

With the game seemingly won by Selby, Heath threw caution to the wind and produced some fast and entertaining rugby in the last quarter. For the most part the Selby defence, with man of the match James Blaymire to the fore, held firm but for one break close to a ruck which was not covered and provided Heath with a deserved consolation 7 point score and a well earned 20-10 victory for the Selby boys.

The tremendous support shown by the Selby faithful was gratefully acknowledged by players and coaching staff alike and without any doubt the performance of the whole team made the substantial effort worthwhile.