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Cougars Suffer Capital Punishment


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London Skolars 30-20 Keighley Cougars Match Report by Joshua Chapman (@JRCSport)

KEIGHLEY Cougars were left stunned after they fell to defeat at the hands off the London Skolars a week before the iPro Sport Cup Final in Blackpool.

Just a week before their showpiece date with the York City Knights, it could have been argued Paul March’s side had one eye on the final, three weeks removed from their semi-final victory on the same ground.

The first half had appeared to set the tone for the afternoon as the Cougars went into half-time scoreless and trailing by eighteen points.

Skolars opened the scoring after just four minutes when Prop Erjon Dollapi powered his way over from close range.

The Cougars were on the back foot and found the deficit doubled when Aaron Small raced through after Paul Handforth raced out the defensive line to make the tackle leaving the space for the London centre to race through.

March’s side were proving their own worst enemies and this showed once more when they failed to react quickly enough to Jy-Mel Coleman’s grubber with Papua New Guinea international Israel Eliab pouncing to score.

There was a moment of controversy towards the end of the half however when Handforth squeezed over the line and was adjudged to have knocked on even though he appeared to have grounded the ball clearly.

It appeared that half-time had come at the wrong time for the home side as Keighley started the second forty in rapid style, scoring four tries to turn the game round and take a two-point lead.

The short-lived comeback got underway six minutes into the half when Ross Peltier ran over an attempted tackle and raced thirty metres to crash over in the corner.

Three minutes later, Ritchie Hawkyard, arguably the Cougars best performer on the afternoon weaved his way through numerous attempted tackles before turning over full-back Alex Anthony to touch down.

And another spell of two tries in three minutes midway through the half completed the turnaround, which appeared to have turned the game in the visitors’ favour.

First, on the back of a penalty, the Cougars produced a flowing cross-field passing move with the ball being eventually worked to Vinny Finigan on the left wing, who raced over to touch down in the corner.

The visitors then took the lead when hooker James Feather took the ball out the back of the scrum and caught London called and raced half the length of the field through the entire Skolars thirteen to go over next to the posts.

However, after just having the lead for six minutes, London re-took the lead when hooker Sam Druce somehow managed to find his way to squeeze through the smallest of gaps to get the ball down.

The game was then put beyond the Cougars when following the turnover, Neil Cherryholme coughed up possession on the Skolars line and Ben Gray pounced the quickest to score from the free play.

Keighley then put the restart out on the full and from the tap, the Cougars were penalised for holding down in the tackle and Charlie Lawrence slotted over the penalty for the afternoon’s final score.

A miserable afternoon would end in miserable fashion when after a bust-up on the half way line, Ritchie Hawkyard and Dave Williams were sent to the sin-bin.



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