Brighouse winners despite losing!

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It’s been a tough week for Brighouse Rangers, playing a midweek fixture against Lindley Swifts and then again on Sunday against Leigh Miners Ladies – fortunately on Sunday they had 14 players unlike Thursday when they started with only 10!

The game didn’t start well for Brighouse though, Leigh Miners are a very well drilled team, they work very well in offloading the ball and putting in miss-out passes, which can leave the defence standing.

For the first 15 minutes Brighouse managed to hold Leigh back before the pressure told and Leigh were able to capitalise on a handling error from Brighouse to score.

From then on it rained tries for Leigh, but the Brighouse team never gave up and in the second half managed to score a try themselves.  Chloe Greenwood put in a great run, collected and played by Beth Greenwood who dropped off Kara Colvin to score under the sticks.  The conversion was by Hannah Callaghan.

The score boosted the morale of the Brighouse side and they kept putting in the hard work.

The young additions to the side worked really hard in defence: Kiara Dillnot, Olivia Sykes, Chloe Greenwood, Holly Thurtle and second game of the season for Megan Lamb.

Brighouse then had to drop down as fullback Holly Thurtle left the pitch with a serious injury and was unable to return.

Against all odds Brighouse battled on until the final whistle and a full time score of 74-6 to Leigh Miners.

The match was played throughout in a great spirit and the endeavour and sportsmanship obviously impressed the referee because after the match he said:

“It’s not often you get the privilege of reffing a great game and only giving 2 penalties in a game..felt really sorry for 1 of teams who ended up with a 74 6 loss…they played excellent for each other but can tell it was, for some of them, a first season….the other team was just more clinical and well drilled…tell them [Brighouse] they were brilliant and should be proud of their performance!”

Player of the match for Brighouse was Chloe Greenwood and for Leigh Miners Mairead Quinn (both no. 13s).

Injury update: Holly Thurtle spent the night in hospital and they have put her foot in plaster until they can operate – despite everything she is in good spirits.

Leigh Miners also had a player with a serious injury too having damaged her ACL.

We wish both players a swift recovery.

Report courtesy of Brighouse Rangers