Old Brod’s U17’s 48 v Otley U17’s 10

After several weeks without a fixture the Old Brodleians Junior Colts entertained Otley at Woodhead on Sunday. The Brod’s team were keen to put together a good performance after several disappointing results away from home so far this season. To add spice to the fixture many of the Old Brod’s Junior Colts are from the U16’s who were knocked out of the Yorkshire Cup by Otley a couple of weeks ago.

Brod’s won the toss and opted to start playing up the slope and into the wind. The windy conditions made progress difficult for Brod’s and several forays into the opponents half were quickly undone by the Otley full back who easily found touch with the wind and slope in his favour. Eventually pressure from the Brod’s paid off and Issac Cracknell jincked over to open the scoring. This was quickly followed by a lovely run from winger Adam Parkinson to score under the posts and with Max Sheldrake’s conversions Brod’s were 14-0 up. Otley then seemed to step up a gear and with the conditions in their favour pinned Brods into their own 22, the home team unable to regain any ground. Eventually after a 5m lineout Liam Ward was able to break through the Brods defence to put Otley on the score sheet. From the restart the Brod’s backs put together some lovely running rugby which allowed Adam Parkinson to score again in the corner. This lifted the home sides spirits and there followed a fantastic try; hooker James Krishnapallai twisted out of a tackle on deep in Brods half and side stepped two defenders to make a break, when he needed support after a 30m dash who should be on his shoulder but prop forward Issac Cracknell who made no mistake and took the score to 24-5 at half time.

With the wind behind them in the second half the Brods started to use their back line to open up the Otley defence, centre Greg Roper was first to score quickly followed by Adam Parkinson claiming his hat-trick with a lovely cross-field run. Otley to their credit fought back valiantly despite being down to 14 players due to their centre twisting an ankle and managed to score another try taking the score to 36-10 but they knew the game was beyond them at this stage. Greg Roper opened up their defence again to score in the corner and then on the last play of the game Issac Cracknell also claimed his hat-trick with a try under the posts and Max Sheldrake took his tally of conversions to 4 with a drop-kick and the final score to 48-10.