As appears to be the norm in this particular fixture; these two sides again produced an enthralling and tense encounter, with the victors emerging from the game with the slenderest margin of victory.

As it turned out; it was Leeds who left the ground victorious on this occasion but they were made to cling desperately to their advantage in a frenetic closing period where passions were clearly running high either side of the touchline.

It was all a far cry from the game’s opening when Leeds second row Keiran Myall collected the Pirate’s kick off and, unchallenged, progressed all the way to Pirates line for the opening score with barely ten seconds on the clock. Alberto Di Bernado was able to add the conversion to notch his first points against his former club.
Things got worse before they would get any better for the hosts as just a few minutes later some slick passing out wide opened up a gap for Richard Welding to dive over and extend Leeds’ lead to 12 points before the “time played” statistic had reached double figures.

The home fans were stunned into silence by their side’s lacklustre start but soon Cornish Pirates began to enjoy some influence on the game and Leeds struggled to contain them, especially at the breakdown and almost inevitably they were penalised at the breakdown during Pirates first meaningful attack of the half and Rhys Jones made no mistake with the resulting penalty to open Pirates account for the afternoon.
The Tykes were penalised continually for offences at the breakdown and this was despite countless warnings from referee Nick Williams who eventually lost patience with them and promptly sent Juan Gomez to the sin bin; and it was Gomez’s offence which allowed Rhys Jones the chance to halve the Leeds lead to 12-6, and he duly obliged.

Jones registered one more penalty goal during Gomez’s enforced rest period and the Argentinian prop had only been back on the pitch a couple of minutes before his team mate Rob Vickerman earnt ten minutes in the spot warmed by him on the sin bin as Leeds continued to demonstrate the sort of constant niggle their coach Neil Back was famous for in his heyday. Leeds found themselves on the wrong side of the referee’s whistle again within minutes and Rhys Jones stepped up to level the scores at 12-12 after 25 minutes.

Tykes responded to the challenge of their hosts by pulling ahead again through the boot of Alberto Di Bernado and then a well worked try from Tom Biggs shortly before half time and it looked like they would head into the break in the ascendancy but Pirates yet again swung the momentum their way as Jones, by virtue of another successful penalty attempt, bought Pirates to within 7 points of their visitors going into the half time break.

Leeds regained a ten point cushion shortly after half time as Di Bernado put over his second penalty of the game; however this was to prove the last points Leeds would score in the game as the home side proceeded to take the game to the league leaders and as a result very nearly handed them their first defeat of the season.

Lead superbly by the contribution of full back Adryan Winnan, The Pirates began to cut loose and put the Leeds defence under pressure. Tykes had clearly learnt their lesson in the first half and were competing legally in the rucks and mauls but they were powerless to stop the Pirates on sixty minutes as hooker Darren Dawiduik was driven over by his colleagues to the delight of the now expectant home supporters. Rhys Jones was unsuccessful with what looked like a simple conversion attempt but the momentum was all with Pirates as the home crowd came to life in anticipation of being the first National One side this season to taste victory against the Yorkshire side; and when the lead was cut down to just two points in the 74th minute of regulation time by Jones’ fifth penalty of the match that anticipation seemed to be becoming reality.

Pirates threw everything at Leeds in the final few minutes as they hunted the vital points that would take them into the lead for the first time in the match and probably earn them the victory, however Leeds demonstrated their strength of defence as they resisted wave after wave of Pirates attack although there were some cries of foul play in the dying moments as a drive was stopped inches from the Leeds tryline but the referee saw no infringement and the move eventually came to nothing.

Eventually time ran out on the valiant efforts of Pirates and Leeds left the ground with their unbeaten record still in tact but for the thirds successive match they have been unable to earn the try scoring bonus point and this has allowed nearest challengers Exeter Chiefs to close the gap at the top to just three points and the encounter between those two teams on 20th December looks like being a pivotal encounter as far as this season’s promotion battle is concerned.

Pirates will be left to wonder how this game might have gone had they not fallen asleep for the opening few minutes, they battled bravely to pull back that early deficit and came very close to overturning it but against a side of the quality of Leeds you can rarely afford to hand then two early tries and emerge with a victory.
The opening five minutes aside, Pirates were the better side and would have been well worth a victory over their previously unbeaten opponents but, of course, the fact is that this is not the first time this season where Pirates have been left to rue a period of a match where they lost their focus for a few minutes and until that particular element of their game is eroded they will keep coming just short in matches such as these.

Leeds were not overly impressive in this particular encounter but they did enough and as a result have come out of a potentially tough run of fixtures against Doncaster, Bedford and Pirates with their unbeaten run still in tact.
Tykes displayed ill discipline both on an off the pitch as the game went on and won’t have won over many neutrals fans with the way they played over the course of the game. They demonstrated clearly that they have a back line full of incisive runners and their support play and offloading from the tackle was also excellent.
Leeds' forwards were less impressive; they struggled at the breakdown for most of the game. They conceded far too many penalties and were turned over on their own possession on a number of occasions, allowing Pirates a platform in the game which they very nearly made the most of.

N1Rugby Man of the Match: Adryan Winnan (Cornish Pirates)
Winnan lead from the front with a display of intelligent kicking and incisive running which nearly catalysed a great comeback victory for his side.