Tarleton Beaten By Blackburn, Seconds Beat Fylde

This weekend, Tarleton were beaten 36-6 by Blackburn, who were perhaps flattered by the final score but there was better news for the seconds, who beat Fylde 55-8.

Tarleton travelled the relatively short distance to Blackburn RUFC to try and get back to winning ways. This was not going to be an easy fixture as Blackburn are unbeaten at home and would be a tough nut to crack.

Several absentees meant a reshuffle in the pack and the backs but on paper it still looked a strong squad that Tarleton had assembled.

The first 10 minutes were even but were marred by Kyrie having to leave the field after being punched and knocked out in an off-the-ball incident that was missed by the referee, shortly followed by Graham Marshall who pulled a hamstring. This left Steve Wood needing to reorganise and with the subs available Tarleton found themselves with a hooker and a flanker on either wing!

However, this didn’t seem to affect the way Tarleton were playing but despite some good runs from both forwards and backs they couldn’t puncture the Blackburn defence.

Neither side could seem to break through and the scoring was limited to penalties only with Tarleton converting two thanks to the boot of Aiden Miller and Blackburn replied with onefollowing a penalty against Tarleton for being offside at the breakdown.

Blackburn then seemed to up their game and almost went over in the corner but some last-ditch defensive tackling by Tarleton kept them out. The pressure continued to be applied and eventually Blackburn, due to quick recycling, found the gap and crashed over to score.

From the restart the Tarleton kick was chased down by Liam Thompson who made good headway into the Blackburn 22 before he was brought down illegally. The penalty was pulled just wide of the upright and the half time score was 8-6 to Blackburn.

The talk was positive at half-time but everyone knew that there were very few options left for Tarleton and they would have to continue playing with players in the wrong positions. However, from the kick off they were awarded another penalty and one of the Blackburn players was sin-binned for killing the ball.

The penalty also went wide and the sin-binning of one of their players seemed to spur Blackburn on to an even faster paced game.  They had realised that they could outpace the Tarleton defence by utilising their speedy winger and fullback and started to throw the ball wide on every occasion.

This tactic worked well for them and basically for the last 20 minutes of the game they scored three tries using it and for good measure also scored two push over tries utilising their bigger forwards against Tarleton's tiring and overworked defence.

The final score was 36-6 to Blackburn who were worthy winners but Tarleton had played well and the score should have been closer.

The seconds continued their good form with a 55-8 win over Fylde away from home which sees them joint top of their league just behind Bolton on points difference.

Tarleton's First XV are at home against Bolton next week which is going to be another tough encounter for them. The Second XV are at home to Thornton Cleveleys which should also be a good match. Both matches kick off at 3.00pm and should be well worth a watch.