1sts Victory from the Jaws of defeat.. AGAIN

Goole travelled to Wheatley Hills for the first time in many years expecting an extremely hard game and that is what they got in a classic game of two halves. As with last week, they got off to the perfect start with a first minute try from Chantry after gaining possession from the KO and continued to keep pressure on the home side increasing their lead with a second try from Chantry converted by Moore off the post to lead 12 – 0 after seventeen minutes.

Despite being under pressure in the scrums Connor Walker did a terrific job at number 8 to mitigate any benefit that the home side may have. Couple this with a number of turnovers at the breakdown and in the tackle, Goole were looking by far the more lively and dangerous team as they stretched the home side at every opportunity. The limited threat from Wheatley generally coming from half breaks in centre field as a result of rare missed tackles by Goole. This brought full back Danny Holt into the game with some excellent tackles and also showing glimpses of his sparkling running with the ball.

Goole’s third try came from an attacking line out when James Walton gathered a loose ball and dived over from the historical Walton try scoring distance of one metre.

As the half was coming to an end Goole almost gifted a try as a result of a loose ball finding its way to the Wheatley centre who picked up and headed for the line only to be caught and stopped with a try saving tackle by a Binns. If Goole thought that they could get to half time without conceding they were disappointed as one of the heavy Wheatley forwards bounced off a couple of would be tacklers to score an unconverted try. Half Time 5 - 17

If Goole were looking forward to more of the same in the 2nd half they were mistaken as the home side took the game by the scruff of the neck as they capitalised on scrum domination and powerful runs by their bigger and significantly heavy forwards. Goole had almost zero possession throughout the vast majority of the 2nd half and conceded four unanswered tries and numerous penalties. As is often the case when under pressure, all the decisions seem to go against you with three yellow cards in quick succession for Shand, Binns and Thurlow. Goole were down to 13 men at one stage and having a torrid time. Wheatley were without their regular kicker and as a result turned down numerous opportunities to kick penalties and with only one conversion from their five tries, this was a key factor in the game. However this did not seem to matter at the time as Wheatley were so dominant as they battered the Goole defensive line but were met with thunderous tackles, some in the eyes of the referee were potentially dangerous, hence the high penalty count.

With Wheatley once again pressing the in the final minutes to secure the win, the ball was turned over under the Goole posts and quick hands from Matty Lill got the ball out to Binns on the wing who ran 80m to touch down under the posts for Goole’s first points of the half and bring the score to 27 – 24. The game then restarted going into overtime.

After Goole gained possession from the restart they kept the ball alive knowing that the game would be over on the next stoppage and worked the ball left and right to get into the Wheatley half. Then, after having a somewhat indifferent kicking game, Rhys Moore produced a superb kick deep into the undefended right hand corner where the ball was gathered by Goole 1st team debutant Luke Beecher to score the winning try in the corner. The conversion was missed and the final whistle blew much to the disappointment of the Wheatley contingent and the joy of the Goole supporters and players. The second half was a hard slog for all Goole defenders but James Chantry was my man of the match for his overall contribution of two tries and countless crunching tackles.

As with their previous two games Goole once again played their “Get Out of Jail” card with tries in the last few minutes to win, and that demonstrates their irrepressible “never say die” attitude. Certainly never a dull game when Goole are involved, but it would be great to see them win with a little more to spare, at least for their supporters blood pressure.