Victory at Milford confirms First Division title
Milford Marlins 6 v 30 Hunslet Club Parkside
The all conquering Hunslet Club Parkside secured the National Conference League First Division title with a 30 – 6 victory away at Milford Marlins on Saturday afternoon (30 September 2017). Together with victories in the National Conference Challenge Trophy and the BARLA National Cup this completed a fantastic season for the club, losing just one game and achieving a meteoric rise from Division 3 of the National Conference League to the Premier Division in successive seasons.
Despite having nilled the Marlins in the League and Cup already this season a tough game was envisaged and that’s how it panned out – certainly in an opening quarter in which both sides found it difficult to settle into any rhythm. It took 25 minutes for Hunslet to come up with the first try which went to big prop forward Luke Pettman whose score was soon followed up with a try to wing Omar Alrawi – both converted by skipper Jamie Fields for a 12 – 0 lead. One further try before half time went to Man of the Match Jamie Bradley – scoring for the second week in a row after his fine effort in last week’s Final to give a half time score of 18 – 0.
The Champions scored three further tries through Jack Kirmond, Mark Stubley and a second for Omar Alrawi with one conversion from Andy Hullock with the Marlins getting their only try of this game – and of this season against Hunslet Club Parkside – on 60 minutes.
Captain Jamie Fields again provided South Leeds Life with his considered thoughts after the game:
“Coming into this game we knew Milford wouldn’t lie down to us and we didn’t expect them to as the first 20 minutes showed. It was really scrappy from both sides and we had to concentrate on completing our sets and turning the screw. Eventually it paid off with the big man Pettman crashing over…after that I thought we turned a corner and pushing on yet again we managed to find what is needed to wrap games up – and we managed to get a few scores on the board.
“Into the second half we tried pushing on again but Milford put up a good fight and with key players missing too!
“Undoubtedly it was all about wrapping up our third successive championship to cap a memorable season! We’re extremely proud of what we’ve achieved and remain grounded on how tough next year is going to be…but we won’t be going into it half-hearted and we won’t be giving undeserved respect out to teams!
“As our Chairman Glen Rawson said “If the Premier Division teams weren’t talking about us before, they are now!”
Man of the Match: Jamie Bradley.
This post was written by Phil Goodfield using our Create an article for South Leeds Life page.
