Lancashire/Cheshire Division Two

Port Sunlight 16

Oswestry 5

Oswestry made the journey to Port Sunlight with a difficult task to come away with a victory to keep the pressure on the league leaders with two games still in hand.

The visitors showed good promise early on by gaining advantage of a dropped ball by the locals, allowing scrum half Nick Clay to set an early attack in the Port Sunlight half.

Nikolai Nikolov and Matthew Bitthell made their first runs of the match to just outside the locals’ 22.

However, the defence was too strong for Oswestry to break through and much of the early play was centred on either side of the halfway line.

Play continued for over 15 minutes without either team breaking through the defensive lines, but Oswestry gave away a number of penalties.

This proved costly for the visitors as Port Sunlight were able to convert two of these and go into half-time six points to the good.

The pressure mounted at the start of the second half, and after conceding further penalties, Port Sunlight had pushed up to near the Oswestry try line.

The number seven was able to run wide of the scrum and drive over close to the posts to score a try. The kick was converted, and the locals were 13 points up.

Oswestry battled on, but yet again from a further penalty the locals extended their lead to 16 points.

From the restart Oswestry tried to get into the match and eventually as the game was coming to an end, after great pressure and determination was shown by the pack, Nikolov was able to run 35 yards and cross the try line in the corner. The kick was missed, and Oswestry had five points.

Oswestry lost the game, but a lot of positives came out of the match by the determination off all players.

On Saturday, Oswestry play their last match before the Christmas break at home against Ruskin Park.

The second team’s game was called off due to the visitors Hoylake not being able to fulfil their fixture.