A strong Salford City Roosters ‘A’ team opened the 2016 season by defeating a very determined Cadishead Rhinos side at home in a local “derby” to move into the second round of the North West Mens League challenge shield.
When the league campaign begins Cadishead will lie in a division above the Roosters ‘A’ team, but on this occasion the Roosters included 5 or 6 lads that will most likely figure in their NCL team this season. On the other hand they also included 53 year old Jimmy Lomax and 45 year old debutant scrum half Mark Hughes who played a big part in the victory.
The man of the match vote though, went to young full back Tom Pratt, closely followed by Ross Smith and Adam Taher. Full back George McCauley-Shaw was most impressive for the Rhinos.
Roosters took the lead on 6 minutes when Ben Connor was held close to the line and Lee Salisbury dived over from the play the ball, although too far out for Adam Walker to convert (4-0). Walker did convert the next try though, on 9 minutes, when Martin Judge collected an astute kick from Hughes on the full to score next to the posts (10-0).
On 13 minutes Richie Hayes opened the visitors account with a try in the corner that was brilliantly converted by Ryan White only for Roosters to stretch the lead again two minutes later. Rhinos knocked the ball on just over the half way line and George Kemp scooped it up to race between the sticks leaving Walker an easy kick (16-6).
At this point it looked like Roosters would run away with the game but Cadishead, to their credit, tightened up their defence and kept the home side out until 3 minutes from half time, and that despite having Tom Connor sent off for a trip on 32 minutes. They could have made life more uncomfortable for Salford as well if their second try had not been ruled out by the referee for a forward pass. Roosters finally broke the Rhinos resolve though on 37 minutes when Taher burst through the defensive line and sent Pratt between the sticks for a try that Walker improved for a 22-6 half time lead.
Five minutes into the second half Taher and Pratt combined to send Judge over for his second try (28-6) and then Taher crashed over the try line himself 4 minutes later, Walker converting both efforts (34-6).
Again it looked like the “floodgates” were about to open but again Cadishead defended manfully until the 70th minute when Pratt sent Tom Smith in for the final try in the corner.
Change kicker Taher took the kick but was unsuccessful (38-6), and with that the referee decided to end the game early with conditions worsening.
