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Lions' five and oh!

Jeff Tyldesley
17/ 7/2008

London Skolars 26 Swinton Lions 22 - SWINTON Lions remain eighth, two points adrift of the National League Two play-off spots after falling to bottom of the table London Skolars.

Swinton were their own worst enemy, spurning an early 10-0 lead by half time and having prop Dave York sent off for use of the elbow immediately after.

This was their fifth defeat on the bounce and with their route to the play-offs seeing them play three of the top five teams in the last six games of the regular season, it would need a dramatic change of form for the Lions to make it.

It started so positively, Rob Line steamrollered over Mario Du Toit to score from 10 yards out before an excellent cut out pass from Martin Moana created enough space for Wayne English to race in.

Swinton could have powered on from there but Paul Crook failed to reach touch with a penalty when in a position to score a third early try and the Lions seemed to leak confidence from then onwards.

A few minutes later and Skolars’ sprightly full back Michael Chan raced in from 80 yards with support on either shoulder from Namila Davui and Corey Simms. Neil Thorman converted and was not to miss a kick all day.

Wayne Kerr then steamed through the Lions defence for a shock 18-10 lead at the interval.

Then came York’s dismissal, Thorman converted a quick penalty for Skolars, but credit to the Lions for not caving in despite being a man short for 39 minutes.

In fact, they then had their best spell of the match, Moana, Bruce Johnson and returning prop Dave Bates all exerted themselves up front as the Lions were also denied a perfectly legal try.

Swinton pressed on and Moana popped up a superb ball for Darren Bamford who lost control with the line waiting.

Then Wayne English went on a dazzling, 80 metre, jinking run but the Lions couldn’t use the field position to turn it into points.

The Skolars came raging back, Kerr blew a certain try but following an evasive run from Chan, Davui made no mistake thanks to Gareth Honor’s flat pass.

Richie Hawkyard’s inside ball then sent Moana flying in for a deserved six pointer but the Lions still needed another score from somewhere.

However, the Lions didn’t test the London line again.

SWINTON fell victim to a Northern Rail Cup final backlash as they lost 44-16 to Doncaster.

High-flying Doncaster were desperate to make amends for being embarrassed by Salford in the cup final just three days earlier. They led 18-0 midway through the first half and Swinton never looked likely to recover.

Positives to take out of the game from Swinton’s point of view were an impressive debut from prop Dave York, Wayne English’s return from a broken jaw injury and consolation tries from Dean Gorton, Liam McGovern and Martin Moana.