Keighley Albion 19 Queensbury 20

A large crowd witnessed a thrilling encounter at Crossflatts as Keighley Albion came agonisingly close to a major cup final appearence.

The home side will look back on this game and wonder how they squandered a 10-0 lead to allow the visiters back into the game and eventually win it in the final minutes.

Albion began in superb style, scrum half Bobby Brown putting a perfect kick over the defence for winger Alistaire Feather to collect and touchdown in the corner. Simon Kelk added the conversion from the touchline with only five minutes on the clock.

Albion kept up the momentum moving the ball across field for Andy Parker to slip a perfectly timed ball to centre Rob Haughey who crossed to make it 10-0. Queensbury hit back going over from close range, but Albion went back once again. Their forwards making the hard yards with Ian Spencer, Glen Palmer and Andy Parker leading from the front. A Bobby Brown drop goal extended the lead. Queensbury came back with a penalty to make it 11-6 at the break.

Straight from the kick-off, Albion failed to control the ball losing possesion on the third play. Queensbury took full advantage to score off the next set of six and put themselves right back in the game.

A Simon Kelk penalty opened Albion's lead once again, but it was short lived as the Bradford side applied pressure on the Albion line and poor marking at the play the ball resulted with a Queensbury try which was converted to put Albion behind for the first time in the game at 13-16.

The drama was far from over, with ten minutes remaining Queensbury conceded a penalty in front of the posts. A quick tap by Glen Palmer saw the Albion skipper crash over which put his side back in front, Kelk added the conversion to make it 19-16 and set up a grandstand finish. The visiters sealed the game in the final minutes moving the ball wide to squeeze in at the corner to make the final socre 19-20.

l Worth Village took Germany by storm when they took part in the Burgen Bears rugby union sevens tournament.

After notching up their third win of the season over local rivals Keighley Albion, Village flew to Europe with their confidence high.

They knew they had to train hard for the two days prior to the tournament as most of the Village players had never played union before.

Before each game Village performed their war dance the 'hokey-cokey' hakka which put fear into the hearts of their continental opponents. Every Village player played their part, particularly richard Emmott who scored seven tries and Damien Summerscales, Shaw, McSharry and Brian Moore with fine tackling skills and powerful running by Sharky, Gillmartin and big Tom McAndrew.

The huge team effort certainly paid off with Graham Sharky winning the man of the match tournament and Village walking away with the Cup.

Coach Donald Plunkett said: "It's nice to see that hard training pays off because you cannot take European tournaments like this too lightly. We know next year we will have to train even harder if we are to keep up with the rest of Europe."

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