Winlaton Vulcans RFC

Winlaton welcomed Houghton to Axwell View hoping to avenge the defeat they suffered to the visitors earlier in the season. The closeness of that result and the controversial nature of their victory ensured that everyone was focused, ready to put in a good performance to start the new year.

Again the team was disrupted due to late cry offs and the back division was especially hit with the veteran centre partnership from the late 90’s rekindled in the shape of messrs Spoors and Horsfall.

Kicking of up the hill Winlaton applied early pressure but after several visits to the Houghton 22 they came away with nothing to show, in blustery conditions and no obvious kicker several penalties were kicked to touch rather than attempt the 3 points. The 1st score of the game came after 15 minutes when an offside infringement left the Houghton 10 with a simple kick 30 meteres out for a 3-0 lead to the visitors.

This spurred the home side and within 10 minutes they had took the lead, some good forward drives on a sticky pitch took their toll and Andy Moore popped over to score. 5-3

The home fans expected this to be the start of the rout but to Houghtons credit they came back hard belying their lowly league status to score a well work try when a neat dart down the blindside produced a try and conversion. 10-5

Fearing an embarrassment Winlaton began to dominate and the pack created chance after chance with the Houghton pack resorting to all types of skulduggery to prevent the score. One such offence seen them reduced to 14 men when the referee lost his patience and gave the visiting hooker 10 minutes rest for pulling the maul down.

From this point a score was inevitable and skipper Scott Urwin duly obliged to pop up with a try under the posts just before halftime.

Half Time 12-10

The second half was all Winlaton, Houghtons efforts in the first half had taken there toll and they offered little in attack but did defend with gusto by means fair and foul but they managed to hold the score until 15 minutes in.

Something would give and unfortunately it was Houghtons cool, on several occasions they resorted to using the dark arts and several fracas were seen, but this didn’t prevent Prop Andy Moore scoring his second try of the game. 17-10

Changes were made with Bly replacing Moore, Morns for Macleod and Harrison for Robinson with all 3 chomping at the bit to get on it actually upped the tempo and another score followed when after repeatedly dropping the scrum 5 metres out the referee awarded a penalty try to Winlaton. 24-10

Another yellow card followed for Houghton when the No6 was called for another collapsed maul and this compounded the problem for a Houghton pack which was already outgunned.

Two more tries followed from Morns following a good kick and chase and also wing Stevenson who rounded off an excellent move to give the match a final score of
36-10.