York Centurions 6-12 Leeds Met Carnegie

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Photos: Jack Western

A Leeds Met touchdown in overtime condemned York Centurions to their second defeat of the season in what was a highly physical, attritional contest on 22 Acres.

The decisive touchdown was scored in near-darkness as the match, which lasted almost three hours, was brought to a painful end for the home side.

After a scoreless first three quarters, Leeds Met touched down in the final quarter with a couple of minutes left on the clock. With just one minute remaining, however, the Centurions equalised with a dramatic touchdown of their own through Sam Parke.

It looked for all the world like the home side would go on to win with this new burst of confidence, but Leeds Met had other ideas with a sucker-punch score to claim a 12-6 victory.

The result means York slip to seventh place out of 10 teams in their BUCS North East league table, with a crucial game coming up on January 20th against Newcastle Raiders.

Today was the Centurions’ first ever home BUCS match after their previous trips to Bradford Bears and Northumbria Mustangs. But this was a much more tense and gritty affair, epitomised by the post-match statistics which revealed that both sides squandered 250 yards in penalty offences.

Archie Pickers impressed for the Centurions early on, making several driving runs into the Met half and rewarding his side with a useful territorial advantage.

Soon, though, the match took on a congested nature as space was at a premium and both sides committed numerous fumbling errors.

Leeds Met were on top at the start of the second quarter as quarterback Rob Wickham was increasingly denied time and space to play, but the Centurions improved, wearing down their opponents and moving slowly upfield.

Indiscipline unfortunately cost the Centurions as numerous penalty decisions went against them. No touchdown opportunities presented themselves and the score read 0-0 at half-time.

The match threatened to become a more open affair in the third quarter as both teams emerged with a renewed intensity, and York continued to probe at their passive opponents.

They had to be careful, though, as in the blink of an eye the away side almost punished a lapse in concentration when the Leeds Met fullback charged some 50 yards before eventually being clattered to the turf by Wickham.

As Leeds Met ramped up the pressure, York had to dig deep with a number of crucial tackles, as James Ashrafi-Tari did on the 10-yard line.

It appeared as though the match was trickling towards overtime as the fourth quarter did not possess the same energy as the previous quarter.

But out of nothing, Leeds Met propelled themselves into the lead. A loose pass from Wickham was intercepted and the men in green surged forward and touched down in the corner.

Late comebacks are familiar to the Centurions and the team remained confident despite the apparent body blow. With merely 73 seconds left on the clock, it was now or never as York entered their fourth down in one particular attack.

In a flash of brilliance, Wickham atoned for his earlier mistake with a superb pass to Parke who caught the ball and celebrated with his teammates as the drama increased in the fading light.

As the match entered overtime, York had an excellent chance to snatch victory but Wickham’s pass was ever so slightly ahead of unattended teammate Sebastian Booth and a relieved Leeds Met won possession.

And so the opposition dealt their punishment on the Centurions as their number 25 touched down to the jubilation of the away support.

After what was understandably a very difficult defeat to take, Centurions quarterback Rob Wickham told Vision:

“I’m proud of our defence – that was a good as I’ve seen them play and I’m very pleased with the turnovers they got.  Conceding penalties probably cost us, we’ve got to be helping out our defence a bit more than we did and in overtime, I just think there were some bad ideas.

“We’ll have a long think about it after Christmas. I’ve got to take some responsibility, but we’re going to come back.”