Rotherham Titans put in an outstanding performance to beat league leaders Leeds Tykes 32-26 in a pulsating encounter on a bright, but gusty afternoon at Clifton Lane.
Titans outscored their West Yorkshire rivals by five tries to four with Jack Taylor and John Okafor bagging a brace each with Harry Dunne grabbing the fifth; Lloyd Hayes added 7 points form the tee.
The result leaves Rotherham 2 points behind Leeds at the top with 3 games remaining and everything is up for grabs in terms of promotion; it’s likely the final outcome won’t be settled until the last game of the season.
The match itself demonstrated a high standard of skill in difficult conditions and was indeed a credit to National League Rugby.
It was Rotherham that came out of the blocks quickest and inside 8 minutes found themselves 10-0 up following a Lloyd Hayes penalty and a converted try from winger Jack Taylor. The latter showed good pace and desire to chase down a clearance kick to dot down in front of a packed clubhouse.
Midway through the half Leeds narrowed the gap when winger Ben Turpin scored a fine solo try when he chased his own kick to score in the corner,
Although Rotherham held the advantage on the scoreboard it was the visitors who held sway in terms of territory and possession. Indeed the hosts had to graft hard on numerous occasions to keep the leaders out.
That graft was rewarded when late on in the first half Rotherham scored two quick-fire tries.
Firstly a lovely break from Lloyd Hayes on halfway saw him feed John Okafor who went in from just outside the 22. Then centre Harry Dunne was on hand to pick up from the base of a ruck to dive over.
With the last kick of the half Lloyd Hayes missed a difficult penalty effort, but Rotherham went in leading 22-5.
The second half was always going to be a testing one for Rotherham as they had the stiff wind in their faces.
The test became even more challenging when in the space of two minutes Titans lost Jack Bergmanas and Zak Poole to the sin bin.
Whilst down to 13 players Leeds unsurprisingly took advantage and grabbed their second try through flanker Jonny Teague following a period of possession inside the Titans 22.
However, once Rotherham returned to a full complement of players on the pitch they quickly added to their tally and secured the bonus point. This came on 66 minutes when a lovely miss-pass from JB Bruzulier found Jack Taylor on the right wing to dive over in the corner to make it 27-12.
Leeds are not top of the table and unbeaten coming into this game for no reason. Inside the final 8 minutes they threw caution to the wind in pursuit of a bonus point.
Their ambition was rewarded with two tries from Pete Lucock and a scintillating one from full back Kieran Davies who finished off a lovely break which started from inside the Leeds 22.
Any nerves Rotherham had were quickly dispelled when late on John Okafor picked up a loose ball inside the Rotherham half and proceeded to gallop home from around 60 metres to secure a memorable victory.
Reflecting after the match Titans Harvey Biljon said:
“I think what stands out the most is the character and heart that Rotherham showed today.
“There was some real adversity through the game; we were down to 13 players at one stage, but the way the players kept on getting off the floor for each other was pretty special.
“The other thing that really stood out for me is if you go back to when we played Leeds earlier in the season, we are a much better team than we were then.
“I think that came through today because Leeds is a team that is in form and you can see the skill they have and the style of rugby they play is pretty attractive; we needed to dig deep and the lads delivered.
“Not everything went our way and you have to give them credit around their set piece, their maul and scrum was functioning and it took us time to get rewarded in those areas and build ourselves into the game.
“There was numerous defensive sets that we had to deal with and the players were outstanding in those moments and that went a long way to earning us our victory.
“I have to make mention of the unbelievable support we had today. Since I’ve been here I’ve seen the crowds growing, I’ve seen how vocal they are and how they get behind everyone and today they were outstanding again; let’s hope they keep coming.”
Referee: Ben Simpson
Yellow Card: Cowen-Leak, Bergmanas, Poole (Titans), Brady (Leeds)
Titans: Taylor (2T), Okafor (2T), Dunne (T), Hayes (2C, P),
Leeds Tykes: Turpin (T), Teague (T), Lucock (T), Davies (T), Irvine (3C)
Titans: 15 Jack Townend, 14 Tomasi Tanumi, 13 Lloyd Hayes, 12 Harry Dunne, 11 Jack Taylor, 10 Will Milner, 9 JB Bruzulier, 1 Charlie Capps (Kivalu 56), 2 Jack Bergmanas, 3 Gareth Denman, 4 Zak Poole (Capt.), 5 Matt Smith (Cowen-Leak 61) (Bustin 67), 19 John Okafor, 7 Laurence Cowen-Leak (Newborn 52), 8 Callum Bustin (Ward 56).
Replacements: 25 Harry Newborn, 17 Loma Kivalu, 30 Reece Ward, 16 Rupert Kay, 20 Will Metcalfe.
Leeds Tykes: 15 Kieran Davies, 14 Callum Irvine, 13 Ben Dixon (Venables 51), 12 Tom Williams (Dixon 61), 11 Ben Turpin, 20 Pete Lucock, 9 Will Hardwick (Macnab 59), 1 Toby Williams, 2 Adam Brown (Capt.), 3 Will Dennis, 4 Jake Brady, 5 Tom Collins, 6 Junior Nu’u (Ademakin 51) (Nu’u 61), 7 Jonny Teague, 8 Eddie Brown.
Replacements: 16 Aarin Yorke, 17 Alex Fishwick, 18 Tobi Ademakin, 19 Charlie Venables, 10 Henry Macnab.
Photo Credit: Gareth Siddons