Doncaster Dragons 52

Keighley Cougars 30

The Cougars staged a superb second-half rally despite being down to 12 men, but it was ultimately in vain as they crashed to defeat at Doncaster.

Phil Stephenson, their veteran prop, was controversially dismissed in the 15th minute by referee Robert Connelly for an alleged high tackle.

The loss of Stephenson was a massive blow for the Cougars and the game was effectively over at half-time as they trailed 28-6.

Their only bright spot was a Lee Pattison try, the second- rower scooping up a bouncing ball to dive in out wide just before the break, Craig Nipperess adding the conversion.

Gary Moorby rallied his troops and reorganised their game-plan at the break and that had an immediate effect, Matt Foster bagging the first of his two tries within 30 seconds of the restart.

Doncaster had moved the score to 40-12 before Foster went over for his second.

He collected a high ball from Matti Firth in typical fashion to score against his home-town club.

Simeon Hoyle then raced in from acting half for a superb solo effort. Nipperess added both conversions and three second-half penalties but the Cougars had given Doncaster too much of an early start for them to have a realistic chance of pulling back the deficit.

Cougar coach Gary Moorby was philosophical, saying: "We put ourselves under tremendous early pressure. On our first three sets of six we made errors which meant we spent the first 15 minutes defending.

"The loss of Phil Stephenson obviously didn't help but I didn't see the incident and can't make any comment.

"However our early errors meant we were ten points down by that point and it was obviously going to be very difficult getting back into the game especially when you're down at 12 men against a very physical Doncaster team.

"We'll have a look at the match video

and hopefully Stephenson will be vindicated - he has an excellent disciplinary record.

"It's frustrating though. We scored 30 points away from home with 12 men and still lost. "I think we're missing an inspirational leader, someone like Jason Ramshaw who can pull things round when the game isn't going our way.

"If you look at all the teams above us, they have experience in key positions.

"I felt for the players today," he added. "We honestly thought we could go and give Doncaster a game but our early errors and the loss of Phil Stephenson have effectively cost us the game."