Leeds City College 64 – 6 Wilberforce College
Leeds City College produced a stunning display to banish their early season form.
Leeds Rhinos Junior Academy hooker Luke Teasdale, along with second row forward Brad Cox – who is on trail with the Rhinos Academy – both made a return to the Leeds City College squad, which made a significant difference.
The visitors opened impressively but the Leeds defence held firm and once they gained possession, the home side began to dominate.
Loose forward Will Millnar was the star, opening the scoring from close range with the first of his five tries, converted by Jordan Rivers.
Leeds scored twice more in quick succession, the first from impressive Teasdale who was a constant threat after a strong drive by captain Dwaine McRae.
Ian Fox then tremendous power to barge his away over from 10 metres out.
Just when Leeds thought everything was going their own way, Wilberforce capitalised on a handling error and scored between the posts through prop Alex Cunningham, goaled by half back Lewis Campion making it 16-6v at the break.
Leeds had the perfect start to the second half, Teasdale exploiting the blind side and delivering a one handed pass to Millnar; who showed speed and balance to race 40 metres.
The Wilberforce pack struggled to cope with the Leeds forwards and strong runs by McGechaen, Fox, McRae and Cox gave half back pairing of Kane Riley and Luke Anderson a great platform.
Riley crossed from Anderson’s perfectly timed kick through and Millnar scored his third when Teasdale offloaded to the non-stop full back Issac Ussman.
Leeds dominated the final quarter of the game and scored five more trouchdowns. Man of the Match Millnar went through to score two more after clean breaks from McGechaen and Teasdale.
Substitutes Raufat Bashir and Sean Stringer made their mark on the game both going from half way for their scores.
McRae capped another fine performance with a try in the closing minutes, Daniel Wheatley taking over the kicking duties from Rivers and converting the final two.
Leeds City College coach Jonny Wainhouse commented, “This was a moral boosting victory; it was just what was needed after a shaky start to this season. There was an attitude to work and to be there for each other today. It was evident that the players are starting to believe in their abilities. The boys should be proud of themselves.”
Leeds City College
1Issac Ussman
2 Jordan Rivers
3 Douglas Foster
4 Luke Hewitt
5 Joe Forkin
6 Kane Riley
7 Jordan Anderson
8 Ian Fox
9 Luke Teasdale
10 Joe McGechean
11Brad Cox
12 Dwaine McRae
13 Will Millnar
14 Daniel Wheatley
15 Karl Hargreaves
16 Raufat Bashir
17 David Marsden
18 Sean Stringer
Wilberforce College
1 Jack Barber
2 Dan Taylor
3 Steven McStay
4 Ryan Wales
5 Jonny Long
6 Mathew Darley
7 Lewis Campion
8 Khaler Gydoggan
9 Liam Smith
10 Alex Cunningham
11 Paddy Wragg
12 Aaron Crosslands
13 Loyd Naji
14 Dwaine Andrews
15 Ellis Wray
16 Adam Flinthan
17 Roy Johnson