Earthblog

KENDAL 13 – LEICESTER LIONS 18

Kendal having lost two home games on the trot were looking to right the record at Mint Bridge on Saturday against Leicester Lions, who are in a rich vain of form themselves.

On a heavy pitch Kendal started brightly and worked a couple of early half chances with fullback Zane Butler heavily involved and in the thick of the play but Kendal were not quite clinical enough to finish off the early promise by putting points on the board.

The first points did arrive after fifteen minutes when Leicester were penalised for coming in at the side of a ruck and standoff Rob Aloe duly kicked the three points.

Leicester’s first points came in the twenty-seventh minute when Kendal were penalised for a high tackle, centre Jonathan Boden stepped forward to kick a solid penalty and level the scores for the visitors. Eight minutes later and Boden had a second opportunity when Kendal were penalised for a shoulder charge, unfortunately for him he slipped on his run up and scudded the ball beneath the posts.

A third kickable penalty chance came Leicester’s way a couple of minutes before halftime but to everyone’s amazement they opted to “tap and go” and some very resilient tackling, especially from centre Matt Gracie, turned the ball over.

The scores remained level at halftime before Kendal again took the lead. A piece of magical running from left wing Lewis Boyd put Kendal deep into Leicester territory and when the visiting pack dived over at the ruck, Aloe was on hand to kick his second penalty of the afternoon. However from the restart Kendal conceded a soft penalty and Boden made no mistake in again levelling the scores for the visitors.

Midway through the second half and both sides endeavoured hard to break the deadlock without any success until the sixty-fourth minute.

Kendal were awarded a penalty in midfield and took a quick tap penalty which in the flash of two quick passes had released replacement winger Jamie Postlethwaite on a flying 45-metre run to the try line during which he simply out paced the defence. Aloe was successful with the tricky conversion to give Kendal a 13-6 lead.

Leicester however had no intention on giving up on the game and through a series of forays into the Kendal twenty-two cranked up the pressure on Kendal with their hooker John Williamson involved in the heart of everything they did. With Leicester battering away eventually something had to give and unfortunately for Kendal it did when flanker Gareth Gore was penalised and shown the yellow card in the seventy-first minute. Leicester attacked again and were only denied when the referee spotted a double movement but no matter the pressure never relented and when Kendal were caught in possession and turned the ball over a moment later second row Junior Fagalilo was being driven over the try line to score a try converted by Boden and once again tie the scores.

That score served to lift Leicester’s intensity and when they forced a 5-metre scrum in the final minute there was to be only one outcome and after a good shove at the scrum flanker Marc Howgate was driven over for an unconverted try that crushed Kendal’s hopes of victory and they had to set for a losing bonus point.