1st XV Match Report - Saturday 21st April

A very unusual occurrence at Mallorie Park this season the sun was out and the ground was firm, this brought a good few supporters from Ripon and also Thornensians who came to help their team survive in Yorkshire 2.

With a minutes silence for our dear departed President Tim Wray who sadly passed away on Friday, Ripon hoped Tim would be looking down on us with the sparkle in his eye and his lovely smile which members will long remember. Tim as President and as part of our executive committee was at the forefront of our recent refurbishment and a very keen advocate of putting our money back into improving our facility and I found him very supportive in my role as Director of Rugby.

With Thornensians fighting to stay up this game was never going to be easy and as our supporters have come to realise we like to keep it entertaining. Ripon started well and had plenty of early possession and were rewarded with a try from Leeming. unconverted with Ripon at times forcing the pass in the tackle rather than being more pragmatic - Go forward with support and play off quick ball Ripon coughed the ball up too many times, Thornensians came to battle and kept to plan scoring a breakaway off a neat chip kick off their talented fly half and converted.

Ripon needed to respond and almost straight away from good line out work Taylor broke from 45 metres to carve his way through 5 defenders and score unconverted. With the score exchanging hands right through the game with a further score for Ripon off Euan Findlay unconverted.

Entering the last 5 mins with the score at 15-17 to Thornensians, Ripon were applying a lot of pressure, Capt. Barker opting to go for the win through scoring tries rather than the kick was rewarded again for his brave decision with Graham crashing over for a well taken try.
This gave Ripon it's 3rd win on the bounce and although the games are close the results are going the right way, next week Wath upon Dearne travel to Mallorie Park for what I am sure will be another entertaining game.

Keep smiling down on us Tim.