I'm all shook up uh-huh!

Just before I left home to go to LS6 this afternoon my wife said that there did not seem to be much joy in these trips. Joy? I am a Leeds Carnegie supporter for goodness sake. Today we entertained Jersey at Headingley and although we ran out comfortable winners in the end we certainly made hard work of it. So what else is new?...

J-Lo picked Hughes to start at 10 today & the cognoscenti were shaking their heads before the kick off. When the game got underway we were pleasantly surprised by the amount of possession that we secured and also by the fact that, in the main, we managed to hold on to it.

The first score came following a searing break by Hampson who continues to frustrate the supporters with his delayed put ins. However in open play he is a live wire and raced into the Jersey half before offloading to Green who was in the outside centre position. In line with his all round excellent game he whipped the ball out to the Doc who pinned his ears back and scored in the corner. Hughes muffed the extras but we continued to dominate. On virtually their first sortie into our half Jersey were awarded a penalty which their 10 popped over to make it 5-3. Hmm.

The next good bit was a ruck near the Jersey line. Where we might have seen Buzz crash over we were instead treated to a neat sidestep by the skipper before crossing the whitewash. Hughes converted and everything was right with the world. We continued to dominate without converting that domination into more points.

On their second visit to our half Jersey scored a fine try which they converted meaning we went in at the break with a slender lead, 12-10. The second period saw an increase in mistakes by both sides. Hughes stretched the lead with 3 penalties  ( to one by Jersey) before being replaced by Lozzer. Both sides made numerous substitutions. Matt Smith came on for Hannay & made an immediate impact. Imiolek looked like a centre when he broke out of our 22. There were some nice moves and offloads but as usual we made mistakes which gifted Jersey both possession and territory.

After Lozzer had stretched the lead to 24-13 with a penalty we were once again camped in the visitors 22. Griffin, who had been busy all afternoon, was waving and jumping up and down like a mad thing. Lozzer made a note of this and when he got the ball from Hampo he kicked over the defence for the corner. Griffin charged through and made a full length dive to touch down before the ball went dead. 29-13 and the score finally reflected the game.

After last week's debacle we could easily have been turned over today. Jersey are a better side than they were last season. We secured enough decent ball to ensure a win and defended well when our mistakes enabled the visitors to press for a second try. Young Beck had a good game, disrupting and stealing lineouts and generally keeping busy with his tackling, plus a couple of breaks out of our 22. Green was always in the thick of it as was Smith when he came on. But for me the Mom award goes to Josh Griffin who capped a good game with a great try.

And finally it was nice to see Elvis come on for the visitors. I knew, deep down, that he wasn't dead!