Keighley fall just short in overcoming West Leeds

Keighley 15 West Leeds 21
Keighley took to the field without 6 regular 1st XV squad members Hamish Pratt, Will Armitage and Alex Brown - all injured and Joe Copperwaite, Lucas Uren and Dave Smith all unavailable.
A fine game of attacking rugby between two well matched teams. At the start West Leeds dominated the exchanges. Excellent interplay between forwards and backs put pressure on the hosts, leading to a penalty for a line out offence, converted by outside half Stefan James. Keighley struggling at scrum and lineout were well and truly on the ropes, a lovely piece of back play allowed the visitors to extend their lead with a well taken try by ex rugby league international winger Mark Calderwood, James added the extras. Eventually Keighley managed to gain some quality possession, which gave outside half Chris Meehan the chance to set the backs moving, a lovely inside ball from centre Ben Blackwell found second row Stuart Inman in support and a try under the posts, converted by full back Alfie Seeley. The last quarter of the half was an arm wrestle between two packs of committed forwards. Keighley with number eight Leigh Sugden and flanker Dan Snowden leading the way managed to force a penalty to draw level at the half time whistle.

Keighley started the second half well, centre Adam Horsfall broke through to set up support runner Alfie Seeley who scored in the corner. West Leeds forced their way back into the game; a number of impressive attacks were halted by stalwart defence. Eventually Keighley were caught offside and a penalty for West Leeds, converted by full back Breakwell. At this stage of the game there was a period of stalemate, and some speculative kicking, one such effort was fielded by a Keighley defender in his own twenty two, rather than pass inside to an unmarked team mate he chose to run the ball, West Leeds gained possession and camped in Keighley territory. Although the hosts defended extremely well, one missed tackle gave winger Calderwood the chance he needed, squeezing himself under the last defender to score in the corner. Sensing victory West Leeds forced the pace. Keighley attempted to drive their way out of defence conceded a penalty that Breakwell converted. With less than five minutes remaining Keighley threw everything they had a weakening West Leeds, with sound ball retention and good driving play they forced the visitors onto the back foot, but the defence held out to the final whistle.