Wirral Toppled by League Leaders

For the last home game of 2018 against league leaders, Hull, Wirral had to make a number of
changes again following the match last week against Vale of Lune.
CHRIS CROWLEY (persistent groin injury,which he has been carrying for a couple of weeks), SAM
BROADBENT (leg injury) were casualties from last week’s game, thus DAN HARVEY moved to fly half
(the 4 th player to play in this key position this season) with TOM PARRY drafted into the centres (a
position he had played in his early school career). JACK YARKER remains on the side lines thus CHRIS
HUGHES started and DAN LIGHT on the subs bench. MATT DALTON started at blind side; BEN
BROOKS and “super sub” MIKE WARREN were the wingers. The other subs were HAYDN LONG and
JON HARRIS.
Following the cold dry weather earlier in the week, Saturday was replaced by a strong wind and
heavy rain, the rain was fortunately not too heavy during the game. Wirral kicked towards the road
with the wind advantage. The crowd was one of the lowest (50) seen at the Memorial Ground for
some seasons.
The early pressure came from Wirral as they played around the Hull 20m area but it was apparent at
this stage that it was going to be difficult to break down the Hull defence. On 6 minutes, Wirral were
awarded a penalty (the only one they were awarded during the first half) and DAN HARVEY slotted
over from 21m out. 3-0. Hull showed good control making slow progress up the field as Wirral
tackling was keen. As early as the 12 th CHRIS HUGHES suffered an injury but continued to play on.
After conceding 3 penalties, Hull were now deep in the Wirral 20m area and a 5m scrum led to their
first try when the scrum half ran wide and drew the Wirral defence before floating a ball over the
would be tacklers leaving the league’s leading try scorer, Stephen Hihetah with an easy walk in 5m
from the corner flag, the conversion was missed. 3-5 (19 minutes). Three minutes later after a poor
clearance by Wirral gave Hull a line-out 20m from the line, a well -executed line out move enabled
the away team to advance forward and mauled their way up to the Wirral line where Paul Hamber
was awarded the try and duly converted by Simon Humberstone, 3-12.
As mentioned earlier the Hull defence was proving difficult to breach and meterage forward was
limited although TOM PARRY made a couple of half breaks. Wirral looked to catch out Hull with long
kicks downfield but on 2 occasions the ball went dead giving Hull a kick off from the 20m area. On 33
minutes DAN LIGHT came on for CHRIS HUGHES (injured). Wirral managed to stem Hull’s attack to
turn round at half time 3-12 down and a quick escape to the warmth of the changing rooms but at
this stage the penalty count stood at 1-6.
Just after half time with Hull down in the Wirral 20m area, a scrum several metres out enabled them
to push the Wirral pack back (which had not been seen in the first half) and the home pack broke up
and the referee awarded Hull with a penalty try, 3-19 (42 minutes). Hull were spending much of their
time in the Wirral half and at this stage RYAN HIGGINSON was injured (apparently a kick to the face-
not seen by me-but interesting viewing on the match recording). On 57 minutes, ROB PEARL was sin

binned for a technical infringement close to the Wirral line. HAYDN LONG and JON HARRIS came on
for PAUL LEWIS and RYAN STEAD. On 60 minutes RYAN HIGGINSON was sin binned for querying the
referee’s decision, which resulted in Hull scoring a second penalty try and their try bonus point. 3-26.
For the next 10 minutes there were uncontested scrums as Wirral had 2 props off the field.
Wirral worked hard to make ground and despite the conditions were able to go through a number of
phases of play without making too much ground. On 70 minutes an astute kick over the Wirral
defence with the Hull backs streaming through gave sub Steve Johnson an easy touchdown close to
the posts. 3-33. A few minutes later a break in mid field led to Hull scrum half, Robin Watts breaking
through from 45m out to score close to the posts ad duly converted. 3-40.
With Hull on the offensive Wirral managed to hold out and the players soon left the field on the final
whistle being blown for the comfort of the changing rooms.
Wirral will welcome the 3 week break to allow time for a number of senior players to recover from
injuries and be available for selection for the next game, which is Lymm away on the 5 th January.
Wirral slipped to 7th after this result.
Richard McNeil