Salford Red Devils 22 Leigh Leopards 28 Match Report
For over an hour, the Red Devils’ Academy side appeared to have victory, over their Leigh Leopards counterparts, within their grasp, in last Saturday’s home fixture with their local rivals, only to see it slip away as the Leopards got on top in the final ten minutes, primarily as a result of the Reds’ indiscipline, not just in that closing period but throughout much of the game.
As a consequence, although Salford were in the lead, with little variation, from the seventh minute, the encounter took on a nip and tuck affair with the visitors being invited back into the game on a number of occasions, as a result of penalties and set restarts presenting them with a significant amount of additional possession, which, in the end, wore the Red Devils down from all the extra tackling they had to do to keep the Leopards at bay.
With ball in hand, from the very outset, the Salford players were a joy to watch, as their slick handling backed up by enthusiastic support play opened up their opponents’ defensive structures, with second rower, Noah Appleby being outstanding in this respect.
As early as the third minute, Leigh were given stark warning of this by stand-off half, Lewis Pilling – making his return after a lengthy injury lay-off – cutting through from a clever dummy, before the move was brought to an end by the cover tackling.
Much of their delightful attacking play was centred around the half back pairing who jelled together so well, and four minutes later, it was scrum half, Dan Jenkinson, who sold another outrageous dummy to sweep through from twenty metres, to score under the posts, and follow up with a straightforward conversion to open the home account.
Two back-to-back penalties, however, which should have been a wake-up call to the whole team, on eighteen minutes, gave opportunity for Leigh to attack the Red Devils’ line, from which they forced an overlap in their left-hand corner, for an unconverted reply.
Another break by Pilling, this time saw him put prop, Matty Eden, through between the posts, in the 27th minute, with Jenkinson’s added conversion doubling the Salford points’ tally, and had the half-time whistle gone three minutes earlier than it did, would have seen the Reds trooping off with an eight-point lead.
Unfortunately, it did not, and the concession of yet another penalty led to Leigh scoring near to the posts to reduce their arears to two points. As if that were not bad enough, a late tackle by Eden, in the dying seconds of the half, saw him sin-binned and the resultant penalty goal tied the scores at half-time, 12-12.
Alternating scores, throughout the third quarter repeatedly saw Salford leads eradicated by the possession gifted visitors, starting three minutes into the half with a great break by left winger, Connor Stubbs, setting up position for Jenkinson to repeat his earlier score, and conversion from under the posts, to put them back in front, for five minutes, before a Leigh four-pointer brought the score to 18-16.
A Leigh handling error, early in their set and close to their own line, gave the Red Devils well-positioned possession, on 57 mins, to produce one of their finest handling moves which put Rhyley Hyde, on this occasion operating at fullback, in at the left-hand corner, too far out for a successful conversion.
Whilst that was to complete the home side’s scoring, the Leopards still had energy left in their tank, and the momentum to go with it. Tries on 62 and 70 mins, the first of which was converted to level the scores, were compounded in the dying seconds of the game – in not dissimilar ending to the first half – with the sin-binning of Fin Walker, for dissent, and Leigh kicking their second penalty goal to bring the game to its conclusion.
Coach, Danny Barton did not have any doubts as to the reason behind the loss:
“We just ran out of energy as a result of all the possession we gave away, and there were a couple of individuals who were particularly responsible in this respect.
“We have done a lot of work around the techniques of keeping their tackles low, but in the heat and speed of the game, they are still falling back into old responses and then being penalised for head-high hits. At this level, though, it is just another learning stage, that they have to go through.
“There were though, plenty of positives to be taken from the game, not least with our attack, which was really good at times, and the commitment of them all was unquestionable as they stuck to the task, right through, and including, the depletion of numbers to twelve for the first ten minutes of the second-half, yet still managing to score a try then despite this.”
With a visit to St Helens, next Sunday, the players will have to guard against gifting possession to them, particularly with the game taking place on the main pitch, prior to the first teams’ fixture.
SALFORD
Rhyley Hyde, Jayden Tyson, Joe Griffiths, Sam Littler, Connor Stubbs, Lewis Pilling, Dan Jenkinson, Harrison Hope, Fin Walker, Matty Eden, Noah Appleby, Fin Buckley, Jacob Walker
Interchanges:
Ellis Clarke, Sam Bradbury, Jacob Morris, Lucas Roper.
