OORUFC Match Report
27th January 2024

Since the split of the Yorkshire 4 league in January, to North and South, the fixtures for Otliensians first XV have been somewhat sporadic. This hiatus gave director of rugby Pete Tempest, a little more time to focus his energies on the 2nd team. This resulted in a super game last Saturday, when ‘Ensians 2nd’s welcomed Selby 4th’s.

Being the first 2nd team game for almost 5 years, and with many ‘retired‘ players making a temporary come back, the atmosphere was bouyant for the 100 strong crowd down at Chaffers field.

With an age range for the team of over 40 years. We saw two father and son combinations; namely Peter and Alex Gillson and Richard ‘Mesher’Smith and his son Seb. We also discovered club stalwart Brett Tenniswood is actually 60 years old, and still fit enough to get stuck into a seconds fixture.

After an electric start by 'Ensians early tries were scored by Alex Gilson and Finlay Vigurs-Pearson in the first five minutes (one converted by Matt Haley). After 10 minutes Selby settled down and play was very evenly contested for the next 70 minutes.

The home team scoring two further tries by Lewis Exley, and Andrew Diamond (one converted by Lewis Exley) and Selby scoring one converted try in the same period.

A superb individual try by Andrew Diamond completed the scoring in the last few seconds of the game giving the home team the victory, by 29 points to 7.

This was a most encouraging development, which hopefully will result in more second team games this season.