Problems increase for Hull as late miss proves costly at Harrogate

It was cruel on the fourth-bottom visitors, who had been 14-0 down at one stage before a second-half comeback.

Strong Hull attacking play was an early feature, but the deadlock wasn’t broken until the 26th minute as the home side began to assert its authority.

Joe Rowntree was tackled just short of the line after a telling counter attack from deep, but Harrogate set up a driving maul from the subsequent line-out. The ball was spun left to Kyle Dench, whose well weighted pass put Stephen Parsons over for a try, converted by Rowntree.

Six minutes later, the home side doubled their advantage after good work by Chris Wilson, who cut through the visitors’ defence to set up Sam Bottomley for another converted effort.

James Cameron’s penalty kick in the 44th minute eventually saw Hull get on the board, but a try from Aarin Yorke in the 52nd minute cancelled that out.

A series of Hull driving mauls resulted in a converted try from substitute Joe Stafford and the visitors’ attacks continued.

A Cameron penalty brought Hull to within six points of Harrogate and then some indecisive defensive play by the home side led to a Hull penalty and attacking line-out.

Stafford drove over for his second try, but the failed conversion gave Harrogate the narrowest of wins.

Sheffield Tigers emerged from a hard-fought battle with Leicester Lions with a vital 27-21 win at Dore Moor, where two late Tom Outram penalties made the difference to an even contest.

Hooker Dave Price pushed the envelope for Sheffield, scoring two tries from similar situations. A penalty was kicked up into the opposing 22 before a rolling maul was set up from a line out with Price driving over on both occasions. Tigers’ other try, scored by prop Will Barnett, was also scored in a similar way.

But the visitors weren’t toothless and tries from Steven Cross, Benjamin Spokes and Jack Gibbons saw the game enter the 50 minute mark at 21-21.

But Outram, who had earlier converted two penalties, found the target with two penalties to push Sheffield on to victory.

Otley went down 27-0 at home to leaders Darlington Mowden Park to leave them pointless for the first time this season.

They had no answer to a Darlington side who had planned how to play the muddy conditions and had a grip on this game from the start, scoring after four minutes after pinching the ball at the base of an Otley scrum for prop Ralph Appleby to charge over.

Fly-half Grant Connon, in addition to his penalty and two conversions, made life difficult for Otley and the visitors went further ahead before half-time, Lewis Johnson utilising the gap left by Michael Coady’s sin-binning.

There were brief moments for Otley, twice James Twomey almost got through, once having his chip through slide into touch then pulled down just short but a penalty and tries from winger Sean McCartney and another from Johnson left them empty-handed.