| York City Knights 18 Featherstone Rovers 16 |
| Arriva Trains Cup - 7 March 2004 |
| A crowd of just under 2,000 spectators was treated to a closely contested game at the Huntington Stadium in a preview of Sunday’s Powergen Challenge Cup 5th round at Post Office Road and, on this showing, the Knights – the only National League 2 team left in the competition - have every reason to be confident of producing another shock result against Rovers. |
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| Knights centre Aaron Wood is tackled close to Rovers line |
| In an echo of their recent games, the Knights started more strongly than their rivals, immediately camping in the Rovers’ half of the pitch. It was, therefore, no surprise when Featherstone opted to take a penalty kick at goal on their first foray into the Knights half but Carl Briggs’ attempt drifted wide of the posts. With York’s Mark Stewart producing a flying tackle on Richard Newlove on the next Rovers’ attack, forcing Newlove to throw a panicky pass into touch, and Ryan Benjefield being held up just short of the line for York, it seemed to simply a matter of time before the Knights posted their first points of the afternoon. Featherstone, however, had other ideas and, against the run of play, capitalised on their first real territory of the afternoon with a try to powerhouse prop Stuart Dickins to take a 4 nil lead. |
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| Yusuf Sozi raises a smile following his try as Ryan Benjafield and Simon Friend look on |
| York continued to press
and, just 5 minutes later, a sequence of play involving
Godfrey, Graham, Jackson and Sozi set up the position for
Danny Brough to fire a bullet pass to Scott Rhodes and
send him over the try line. Brough added the extras to
take the Knights into a 6 – 4 lead. However, a Lee
Jackson knock on gifted possession back to Featherstone
and Dickens romped in for his second try of the
afternoon, Briggs again missing the conversion. Brough’s short kick off on the restart saw his centre, Aaron Wood, out jump the Featherstone defenders and quick passing from man of the match, Simon Friend, Rhodes and Mick Ramsden set the position for Knights’ prop Yusuf Sozi to show he could do whatever his opposite number could do, touching down for the Knights. Brough converted to take York to 12 – 8 before Briggs added two points, courtesy of his penalty kick rebounding off the upright to take the half time score to 12 – 10. |
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| Tom Andrews keeps a watchful eye on Rovers loose forward Adam Hayes |
| Featherstone were quickly into their stride in the second half scoring after just two minutes when Matty Wray made the most of the overlap following some precision passing from Richard Chapman, Ian Tonks and Newlove. Briggs finally added a conversion to extend Rovers’ lead to 12 – 16. With Steve Dooler already on report for Featherstone, Tonks and Chapman were then sinbinned for fighting, together with Benjefield. The Knights were unable to make the most of their extra man with Rovers’ producing some sterling defence to repel the York attack. Following his return to the pitch, Chapman was placed on report for an off the ball incident and York capitalised on this disruption. Jackson atoned for his earlier error by evading several would-be tacklers and firing a pass to Wood, who managed to provide the sweetest offload just before he was tackled into touch. Godfrey was the grateful recipient and charged over to level the scores before Brough added the conversion. A scoreline of 18 – 16 ensured a tense final 10 minutes for both sets of spectators as well as the teams on the field. |
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| Supporters keep a close eye on the action |
| Knights’ coach, and ex-Featherstone player, Richard Agar, admitted he “wasn’t over-enamoured with our performance today but I thought we dug in exceptionally well. All credit to Fev, we will take the win but the lads in the dressing room are far from happy with their overall performance today and we know we will have to improve next week”. When asked if he could see any positives from their performance, Featherstone coach, Gary Price, responded with a very terse “No” and wouldn’t be drawn any further. However, it sets the scene for another mammoth battle next week and both sets of supporters will be relishing another mouth-watering contest between their teams. |
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| Chris Langley goes close for the Knights |