Rugby union: Great Scott helps Longton give leaders a fright

LONGTON'S Scott Rawlings enjoyed a ding-dong battle with England sevens star Ben Gollings during their 26-17 home defeat to runaway leaders Rugby Lions in National League Three Midlands.

Rugby's juggernaut endured one of its toughest assignments of the season as Longton briefly threatened to upset their 100 per cent record.

ROAR OF DELIGHT: Kieron Healey is just visible as he celebrates his try beneath a crowd of Lions players.
ON THE RUN: The influential Scott Rawlings makes a break for Longton and, right, Joel Booth celebrates his try. Pictures: Phil Radcliffe

The scores remained locked at 0-0 until the 34th minute when Longton, reduced to 14 men after Rawlings was sin-binned for colliding with Gollings, conceded the first of four tries.

And it was Gollings who kicked ahead in the second half to eventually land on the ball and claim Rugby's second for a 12-0 lead.

Longton were rucking aggressively and Rawlings, enjoying one of his best games of the season, clashed with Gollings again en route to eventually providing Joel Booth with Longton's opening points.

Longton retained an excellent initiative as a series of pick and drives led by Craig Wilson eventually allowed flanker Kieron Healey to push off an attempted tackle by Gollings to touch down a well-worked try to leave the score 12-10 to Rugby.

But the visitors turned on the heat to pull clear again with two tries to effectively kill the game.

Longton rallied at the end, however, and fully deserved a third try as exciting teenage scrum-half prospect Sam Moores took a quick tap penalty before sprinting through a gap to score.

LEADERS Sandbach surrendered their unbeaten home record in a narrow 11-10 defeat to local rivals Northwich in North One West.

Sandbach were starved of territory and possession as brothers Rich and Chris Dale catapulted Northwich into an 8-0 lead.

Sandbach fancied their chances down the slope in the second half, but soon had Matt Jackson sin binned for tackling an opponent off the ground.

The home side finally opened their try-scoring account when fine link play involving player-coach Simon Verbickas left Ben Elliott crashing over for a try he converted himself.

Now trailing by a solitary point, Sandbach twice came close to nicking the game when Elliott tried and failed with two drop goals.

Defeat cuts Sandbach's lead at the top of the table by three points to 16 ahead of next weekend's derby against Wilmslow.