Cards Cost Tigers

Two yellow cards at crucial points of the game cost Sedgley Tigers dearly at the weekend as they lost away from home to Darlington Mowden Park 17-13 in an extremely close-fought contest.

Sedge turned their recent form right around with a very gritty performance against the top side in the league who look well on track for a first visit to National League One.

The second team in the league (4 points behind Macclesfield in first with a game in hand) were made to work hard for their win as the Tigers adopted a high tempo game-plan on the front foot, causing trouble for the home defence; however, on the back foot they matched the home side’s quick enterprising decoy running attacks, keeping the Tigers defence on their toes.

DMP executed a great decoy run early on in the game and drew first blood. A final missed tackle just before the line from Sedge made it a simple try for the home side.

Sedgley, though, came straight back at Darlington with a great break down the right hand wing by Andy Riley who was stopped just shy of the line.

Numbers came in support and four driving phases for the line were repelled. Paul Urmston at scrum half got the ball out wide finding Matt Riley with one tackler to beat to go between the posts for Tigers first try.

At this stage Tigers looked on top and with an extra six points coming soon after extending their lead things looked good. However a harsh decision to yellow card Billy Emerson for a high tackle with 10 minutes to go to the half gave the home side new vigour as they tried to make the extra man count.

Tigers organised the defence well and kept the score down with DMP only gaining another 3 points before the end of the half.

 

Halftime

DARLINGTON MOWDEN PARK 10

SEDGLEY PARK 13

The second forty started well for Tigers and better decision making by the wide men may have seen extra points for the visitors however a very tight defence kept out Tigers but even better work at the breakdown from the home side turned defence into attack driving Sedge back.

A huge driving maul by DMP down the left wing looked to have been stopped by Sedge; however, the drive continued and two big phases later they nipped over for a forwards try to give the home side a three point advantage.

The fallout from the try was Johnny Mathews was alleged to have pulled down the maul and was yellow carded for his efforts.

This gave DMP the advantage for the rest of the game as they applied a stranglehold around the collective throat of Sedge, a hold that reminded until the final whistle.

In the final summary DMP edged the game and deserved their win. They look destined for that automatic promotion place to National One next season and we wish them well in that endeavour. Very good hosts today and excellent facilities.

Although this was Tigers fourth consecutive defeat, they can take a great deal of positives from the game today as Sedge returned to the type of performances that at one stage this season had some pundits putting the Tigers for a promotion place.

Tigers play Hull at Park Lane next week.

The second team had a tight affair at Park Lane against Sale FC today but had enough in the tank to take all the points and keep them on top of the league.