Battling Leeds return from the Pirates with share of spoils

Leeds were unrecognisable from the team thrashed 52-10 at the Pirates in late September, and even came close to snatching an unlikely victory.

Pirates enjoyed far more territory and possession in a very scrappy encounter, especially in the second half, and gave Leeds a torrid afternoon at scrum time, but they could not turn that advantage into points, and true Yorkshire grit saw the visitors collect two valuable points from their opening Group B game.

Proud Leeds head coach Diccon Edwards said: “Our desperation to defend our own line and our commitment to each other and the way we just stuck in there was a credit to the players.

“We found it tough in the scrum at times,” he said. “We have got to accept we are playing against big, physical packs and we have got to get our set-piece right.

“We will look at it, and also talk to referees about interpretation, but what we did do was stay in the contest and we managed to get something out of it. Not many teams go down to Pirates and get anything.

“I am sure Pirates were disappointed with elements of their execution, as we were, but both teams will be better for playing that first play-off game. Everything has gone up a notch in terms of intensity, and we have not experienced that before as a group.

“We will now look forward to the Rotherham game with real intensity in our training.”

Leeds got off to a flying start with a penalty by fly-half Joe Ford after only three minutes.

But injury-hit Pirates responded eight minutes later when centre Grant Pointer latched onto a grubber kick through by Canadian international Matt Evans to score a try in the corner, which full-back Rob Cook converted.

Leeds pushed their noses in front when a period of pressure in the 22nd minute was rewarded as full-back Stevie McColl made the most of some shoddy Pirates’ tackling to gallop in from 25 metres to make it 8-7.

Another Ford penalty in the 55th minute stretched the lead to four points, but Leeds then came under the cosh on their own line for a lengthy period, with replacement lock Tom Denton sin-binned for coming in at the side of a maul.

Referee Paul Knowles eventually awarded the hosts a penalty try, converted by Cook, but with Leeds still down to 14 men, Ford slotted his third penalty of the afternoon to level the scores at 14-14 with eight minutes remaining.

Pointer had a chance to win the game for Pirates with a 52-metre penalty with the last kick of the contest, but it fell short to leave the match tied.

Cornish Pirates: R Cook, T Kessell, G Pointer, T Cooper (A Suniula 59), M Evans, A Penberthy (C Thomas 77), G Cattle (capt), C Rimmer (P Andrew 69), D Ward, A Paver (L Fairbrother 73), M Smith, I Nimmo, D Ewers (P Burgess 53), C Morgan, K Marriott (B Maidment 53). Replacement not used: T Cowan-Dickie.

Leeds: S McColl, M Stephenson (J Davies 23), I Thornley, S Barrow, P Lucock, J Ford, W Cliff, S Lockwood (D Young 50, H Aulika 80+4), A Titterrell (capt) (P Nilsen 45), H Aulika (G Denman 59), J Pendlebury (D Paul 64), D Hemingway (T Denton 46), E Williamson, J Rowan, R Burrows. Replacement not used: C Hampson.

Referee: P Knowles (RFU).