Blackpool 10 Ashton under Lyne 55

9:56am Monday 17th March 2008

Comments (0)   Have your say »

Blackpool continued with their long line of losses in this North Lancs 1 fixture when they again went down to Ashton under Lyne by 55 points to 10.

The home side kicked off against the wind in the first half and had their usual try scored against them in only the 4th minute of the match.

It would appear that Blackpool don't wake up until they have a score against them this season and wake up they did when the customary try was scored.

They began to string together some attacking moves and were rewarded with a penalty in the 7th minute which stand off Sean Donnelly kicked to bring the score to 7 - 3 in Ashton's favour.

There followed some dogged defending by the Blackpool side, which saw them contain the score to 29 - 3 at half time.

The team talk to Blackpool at the break was given by No 8 Heath George who stressed that his side was playing well and they needed to get at the Ashton side if they were to make any headway.

This seemed to have the desired effect when, apart from the opening 10 minutes of the half, Blackpool put Ashton under some extreme pressure and were camped in the opposition 22 metre area for 20 minutes.

The home side were rewarded in that period when Heath George went over to score a try close to the posts, which was converted by Donnelly.

This seemed to spark Ashton into life as they came back within 5 minutes to score themselves.

This lead to some tit for tat rugby with first the home side and then the visitors applying pressure but Blackpool were unfortunately unable to convert this into points which the Ashton side managed to do.

Ashton under Lyne ran out winners in the end by 55 - 10 but Blackpool should stand proud as they never let their heads drop and fought until the very end.

There is no match over the Easter break so Blackpool has a week off to try and re-group before the final run in for the season.