Bradford & Bingley 17

Otley Academy 36

Otley travelled to Wagon Lane for a second time this season due to fixture congestion at home. They were able to benefit from a mix up with the Under-17s game which left them without a game and six of this team were used in the starting line up.

Early exchanges were tetchy and there was niggling in the scrums.The Otley boys did their best to play a disciplined game but unfortunately after further provocation the situation boiled over. This resulted in the dismissal of Otley No 8 Chris Thornton, and later a sin-binning for the Bees hooker.

The rugby did the talking however and Otley began to play with more confidence and on 25 minutes back row Joe Bennett was on hand running an excellent line to pick up from a tackle and score.

Shortly afterwards Johnathan Woods was released for a score wide out. Just before half-time prop Alex Laycock drove over to take the score to 24-0.

A number of changes were made notably Alex Thompson who was straight in on the action with a weaving run which stretched the score three minutes into the half.

Now it was Bees turn, in a 20 minute spell they ran in three tries, one converted to bring the score back to 29-17. Otley were feeling the pinch with 14 men at this stage but rallied for the last 15 minutes with some solid defence. Five minutes before time Duick Young, now at centre, bulldozed his way through the defence for a well earned score.

Jack Lewis added four conversions and a penalty. This was a successful exercise in integrating the Under-17s into next season's squad

Otley U-17s 8

Huddersfield 16

OTLEY started well in this Saturday fixture and for the first 20 minutes had all the ball mostly in the Huddersfield 22 metre zone. Unfortunately this could not be converted into points.

As seems to be the pattern the visitors penetrated the Otley half for the first time on 22 minutes for the winger to run in a score.

This produced some determined forward play and Chris Thornton made good ground to set up good position. He was then on hand to pick up a pass and power his way through to level the scores.

Not long into the second-half the Huddersfield wing won the chase for a touchdown. Liam Duffy brought the score back to 8-10 with a penalty ten minutes later. The game didn't seem to progress after this Huddersfield extending their lead with two further penalties.

UNDER-10S

On Sunday Otley Under-10s played in the Leeds District Tournament which was held at West Park Bramhope.Weather conditions were fine although the pitches were suffering a little from all the recent rain.

In their first game against Roundhegians Otley started slowly allowing their opponents to dominate the first-half.

After the half-time team talk they finally started to give a good account of themselves unfortunately they couldn't breach the determined defence enough times. The final score was 15-5.

Determined to give a good account of themselves in their second game Otley took the game to Mods with a brilliant display of open, running rugby against much bigger opponents.

The ball was spun around the park using the full extent of the pitch to probe their opponents defence and winning 20-5.

Needing to consolidate against Morley the Under-10s struggled to press home their territorial advantage against determined opponents. The game was finally decided by a breakaway trymaking it 5-0 to Morley.

With nothing to play for Otley produced their best display of the tournament against Leodiensians and once again spun the ball to all corners of the pitch.

Alex Hartley was tackled just short and a typical bullocking run by Sam Thornton was also thwarted just short. Despite relentless pressure Otley failed to break the resolute defence and once again two breaks from defence resulted in Leos winning 10-0.

Once again inconsistent form prevented the Under-10s realising their full potential. However, there many positive points to bring away from Bramhope.

Josh Howarth backed up and covered the field excellently; Danny Oldfield continued his recent good run of form; Sam Thornton was involved in everything; Ben Weaving revelled in the freedom away from the scrum and Ben Brierley was everywhere.