Bonus Point Win

Leigh regrouped yesterday, at Hand Lane, following their defeat at Bolton last week and came away with a well deserved, bonus point, win against Sefton.

Rob Drake’s trusty boot opened the scoring with a penalty, after eight minutes but Leigh added to this, in the twelfth minute, when the forwards set up a good platform for the backs to launch an attack. A brilliant, long cut out pass from Rob Drake found Jamie King in space for him to draw the defence before putting winger, Jake Westwell, away down the left, for a well taken try.

Sefton soon responded with a well taken, converted try of their own, on the twenty minute mark, when Leigh failed to clear their lines and turned over possession. Rob Drake added another penalty to extend Leigh’s lead and the sides went off at half time with Leigh leading by eleven points to seven.

Leigh came out of the blocks firing on all cylinders after half time and an excellent sniping break from Alex Leadbetter was finished off by Marcus Morris-Williams under the Sefton posts. Rob Drake added the extras.

This try was almost immediately followed by another piece of Alex Leadbetter wizardry. He caught the Sefton defence napping, by taking a quick tap penalty and diving over for an opportunistic try under the Sefton sticks. Rob Drake again added the extra two points.

Leigh 25 Sefton 7.

At this point, many of the spectators thought that Leigh were going to run away with this game but Sefton had other ideas and staged a remarkable comeback, in which they added two unconverted tries, in quick succession, to narrow the margin to eight points.

Leigh picked themselves up from this onslaught, to work their way back down the pitch and they were rewarded for their efforts when another sublime pass from Rob Drake found Jake Westwell ,running out wide on the left, for him to step and crash his way through the Sefton cover defence, for an excellent finish. Rob Drake slotted a magnificent conversion, from wide out on the left.

Sefton rallied again and got over for a well taken, converted, consolation try in the seventy eighth minute, which earned them a well deserved losing bonus point.

Final score Leigh 32 Sefton 24.

This was an encouraging performance, with several players catching the eye for their contributions but Alex Leadbetter, in particular, was outstanding in the backs, with Charlie Wood being the pick of the forwards.

Next week Leigh travel away to Northwich to take on sixth placed Winnington Park.