Longton kicked off in fine rugby playing conditions and were dominating the early exchanges, the scrum was solid and captain Gareth Rawlings was commanding in the lineout. Within the first 10 min. Longton had a couple of drives close to the Luton line but to give away careless penalties and lose possession. Luton drove up the park and Longton gave away a penalty 25m from the posts, the fly half Aidan Kenney duly slotted over the penalty for Luton to take a 3-0 lead. After another 5 mins Luton had a number of breaks to get to the Longton 22, with a penalty for offside, Kenney had an easy kick for another 3 points. 6-0 to Luton. At this time Longton lost openside flanker Aaron Horne to a shoulder injury, he was replaced by James Daniel.

This spurred Longton to their best spell of the game, from the half way line, forwards Craig Wilson and Gareth Rawlings combined well to put winger Chris Tennuci clear from 30 m, he skated past the opposition winger to score the first try of the game, with an excellent touchline conversion from Chris Buck Longton took the lead, 7-6. From the next attack fullback Lee Brogan was just wide with a drop kick attempt, from the restart Luton handled in the ruck and Chris Buck knocked over the penalty, 10-6 to Longton.

On the 30 min mark flying winger Tennuci took the ball in his own half, driving through hapless Luton tackles he broke clear to score his second try, with another excellent touch line conversion from Buck, Longton were beginning to build up a lead, 17-10. A few minutes later, Tennuci again found himself in space, this time he switched inside, beat the tackle on the 22 and passed out to scrum half Ben Robson who touched down near the corner post, with the conversion just wide, Longton were heading for half time 22-6 up. Luton managed to convert a penalty just on half time, and Longton went in 22-9 in the lead.

The second half was a totally different game, with one exception when Longton had a 3 on 2 overlap, only to throw the ball into touch, Longton were never in the game. Luton had worked out how to stop the ball getting to the wide men, Luton centre, former England “A” and Northampton centre Matt Allen was instrumental in nullifying any Longton attack. From a 13 point deficit, Luton began to claw back the gap, flyhalf Kenney slotted over another penalty, 22-12. The Luton forwards were on top in open play, they were first to every breakdown and continually knocking the Longton forwards off the ball, the Luton loose head, Neil Harris scored the first Luton try, with Kenney converting, 22-19 to Longton.

After 22 minutes, Kenney was successful with another penalty for a Longton forward being offside, to draw the game level at 22-22. Longton still could not get their hands on the ball and with 10mins to go the Luton forwards drove over for the second try, with the conversion, Luton took the lead 29-22. Luton hung on for the last 8 minutes but were never under pressure.

As the cliché goes, this was a game of two half’s, the Longton backs dominated the first half with exciting, free flowing rugby, but the second half belonged to the Luton forwards. They harassed and bossed the Longton forwards and did not give them any opportunity to play their normal game.

Next week Longton are at home for the first ever visit of Sheffield Tigers to Trentham Lakes, hoping to regain top position in the league, after Broadstreet winning at Kenilworth to take top spot by 1 point.

Neil Pickering