Battling Pocklington RUFC suffer Papa John’s Plate semi-final loss at Bradford Salem

Pocklington RUFC scrum-half Rob Boddy boots the visitors onto the attack at Bradford. PHOTO BY BECKY BRETT

A spirited display by Pocklington RUFC was not enough to beat Bradford Salem as they were knocked out of the Papa John's Northern Plate at the semi-final stage by 43-12 on Saturday.

Salem were the only team to defeat Pocklington twice in the regular league season on their way to the league title, writes Mark Fletcher.

However, in both of those matches their team did not include ex Castleford Tigers winger Adrea Vasuitoga and former Wakefield Trinity and York Knights and current Doncaster RL player Pauli Pauli.

Both have been brought in recently and helped to create a side that can almost score at will.

Pocklington started the game brightly dominating possession and keeping their discipline, Salem were frustrated, with their repeated infringements giving Pock three kickable penalties and earning the home side a yellow card.

Christian Pollock converted all three kicks to give Pock an early 9-0 lead.

Salem had little possession in the first quarter, but on 20 minutes they made their first real attack pay as they shipped the ball right and Vasuitoga squeezed past the Pock defence and scored in the corner.

Despite the setback and the obvious power in the Salem threequarters, Pock hit back and on the half hour Pollock nailed a penalty from the halfway line to make it 5-12.

Salem were getting into their stride now, and a training ground move put Pauli Pauli in under the posts, the conversion levelling the scores.

Shortly afterwards they repeated the move with the same outcome to take the lead which was extended with a penalty kick on 40 minutes for a half-time score of 22-12.

Pocklington defended very well through the third quarter, but on the hour mark Pauli Pauli broke down the centre and whilst being tackled managed a clever offload for his centre partner to run in a try; the conversion was missed, but the referee ordered a retake for an early charge and this time the kick was successful.

Salem managed two further converted tries to put the game beyond reach, and despite Jack Helme and Will Barrett going close, Pock were unable to trouble the scoreboard.