Oswestry 21 Garstang RUFC 32: Visitors claim their first win of the campaign

They are not back in action again until Marple are their visitors a week on Saturday, following on from last weekend’s 32-21 win at Oswestry.

From the off Oswestry took the game to Garstang, and within a few minutes, they scored the opening try of the game to take a 7-0 lead.

Things soon got worse for Garstang as they lost Harrison Pickervance to a rib injury and then conceded a second converted try to trail 14-0.

Garstang needed a spark and it came when Andy Tissingh broke through midfield with the resulting pressure seeing Greg Billington force his way over for a try to make it 14-5.

However, with Garstang starting to establish themselves, they were undone when Oswestry scored an excellent try that went the length of the field with the conversion making it 21-5.

With half-time approaching Garstang closed the gap with a try from Edgar Nicholls who, having received the ball 15 metres out, wriggled through the first two tacklers before driving over the line.

Duncan Lambert added the extras as Garstang trailed 21-12 at the break, after which they began to assert more control.

The main reason was the total dominance they started to achieve up front, due in no small part to the influence of Max Everest who entered the game just before the break.

Fifteen minutes into the half and a well-worked move off the lineout ended up with Gavin Barton squeezing over in the corner (21-17).

Oswestry missed two relatively simple kicks at goal, which Garstang capitalised upon as Barton ran through a gap and sent a reverse pass to Josh Knowles, who went over with Lambert’s conversion putting them 24-21 ahead.

Lambert slotted over another penalty to extend the lead and, with the last play of the afternoon, Lawson Whittaker released Tom Smeaton who touched down in the corner to confirm victory.