Cleckheaton 16

Hull 15

Gary Pearce was more puzzled than anything after his Hull side had lost this Powergen Cup second-round North tie.

The former Welsh rugby league international looked on from the sidelines and said afterwards: "I cannot believe that we were penalised so many times when we were going forwards.

"We had a lot of pressure but it seemed that every time we got a bit of pressure in their half we got on the wrong end of a penalty decision.

"We always thought that we have a good squad, and with four or five missing here we have proved to ourselves that we have a good squad.

"Cleckheaton are a good side - they went up last year from the division that we are in now - but we have proved in the Powergen Cup against Halifax last season and against Tynedale and Cleckheaton this season in the same competition that we are a good side too.

"Chris Kendra played well at scrum half and our forwards played well as a whole, but it is early days in North Division One this season - too early to say whether we can go up or not."

Cleckheaton second row Craig Rika said: "It was a very tough match and Hull had a solid pack, but we played the wrong sort of game against them.

"We should have been looking more to get the ball wide because we scored a couple of tries down the right wing.

"However, so much these days depends on which side has a good goal-kicker, and we have a good one in Glenn Boyd."

Boyd only landed two of his five kicks at goal, but he missed nothing that was simple, and the same cannot be said of Hull skipper Guy Martinson.

The full back had a simple penalty from in front of the Cleckheaton posts in the 27th minute, but hooked it wide.

Pearce wasn't about to blame his captain, however, saying: "He made a brilliant 40-metre run straight afterwards so it obviously didn't affect him."

The strength of Hull's pack was seen in the opening two minutes with a tremendous drive in Cleckheaton's left-hand corner which almost brought a try.

Boyd put the hosts ahead with a penalty in the eighth minute, and although his long pass 11 minutes later bounced before it reached Bentley, the former England international's inside pass gave skipper Mark Billington enough room to crash over in the right corner.

Boyd's conversion attempt hit the far upright and bounced out, but he added a penalty on the half hour to make it 11-0, rubbing in Martinson's failure of three minutes earlier.

And just when it looked as if all Hull's first-half efforts would come to nothing, they scored in the fourth minute of injury time, second row Gareth Jackson diving over for a try which Martinson converted. Hull had centre Julian Barkworth in the

sin-bin for slowing down play at the tackle when Bentley crossed after 52 minutes, Boyd again narrowly failing with his conversion attempt from the right-hand touchline.

Cleckheaton's replacement prop Carl Mason then found his way to the sin-bin in the 58th minute for the same reason as Barkworth, Martinson's penalty narrowing the margin to 16-10.

Boyd just failed with a long-range penalty four minutes later and Hull then had their best spell of the match.

Left winger Matt Donkin failed to collect a low Martinson pass when in the clear, but right winger John Wilson was awarded a controversial try in the 67th minute, Cleckheaton claiming he hadn't grounded the ball properly in their left-hand corner.

With a third-round trip to Kent-based National League Three South club Westcombe Park very much up for grabs, Cleckheaton then roused themselves sufficiently to almost score a try themselves five minutes later.