Yorkshire Division One: North Ribblesdale 7 Bradford Salem 14

A STRONG second-half performance at North Ribblesdale earned Bradford Salem their first league win of the season.

Playing into a stiff breeze at Grove Park, Salem were under pressure in a scrappy opening quarter in which both sides were guilty of unforced handling errors.

The deadlock was broken after 21 minutes when, after flanker Sam Savage was caught offside, some great offloading in the tackle resulted in a try for Richard Wood, converted by Jonathan Richards, to put the home side 7-0 in front.

To make matters worse, Savage had to leave the field with what looked like a serious knee injury.

Salem had a gilt-edged opportunity to hit back ten minutes later but debutant centre Jake Abram chose to go himself rather than use winger Ryan Smith outside him, and the chance went begging.

However, the hosts also spurned a number of scoring opportunities and could possibly count themselves unlucky to be only 7-0 up at the break.

With the wind at their backs in the second half, Salem fly half and skipper Andy Robinson started to put his side on the front foot with some astute tactical kicking.

Although Ribb missed a relatively easy penalty kick, Salem responded well as swift handling in the backs created an overlap on the left, and winger Nick Fontaine showed strength and pace to score a fine try which was improved by Robinson to bring the scores level at 7-7.

Salem should have taken the lead after 57 minutes but Robinson hooked his simple penalty attempt wide.

However, the former Wibsey Warrior soon made amends as he dummied his way over for a majestic try that he improved himself to put the visitors 14-7 ahead.

Salem then suffered a major blow as strong-running centre Conor Wood had to leave the field with a nasty head injury.

Desite this setback, the Bradford side should have made the game safe but another penalty miss from Robinson kept the home side within a score.

Despite conceding a series of penalties in the closing stages, Salem's defence held firm and they ran out deserved 14-7 winners to move them up to eighth place in the table.