Orrell St James A 22 Woolston Rovers A 18

ROVERS suffered only their third defeat of the season when a late fightback was not quite enough in a hard-fought North West Men’s League Division Four fixture.

Coach Andy Penny feels the loss by a much-changed team is a minor slip rather than a major setback.

“I cannot fault the effort of the lads as they gave me everything from start to finish,” said Penny, who named himself on the bench due to a player shortage.

“It was a difficult afternoon with so many changes but we still had opportunities to get a result and I believe that if we had played for another few minutes then we would probably have got the win.”

“We won’t dwell on this too much. We have been on a great run and hopefully this is just a minor blip. We are still in a great position as we enter the final couple of months of the season.”

Adam Files, Sam Files and Olly Parr scored tries for Rovers, who trailed 22-6 at one stage.

Six minutes into the second half Rovers, who were 12-0 adrift at the break, got on the scoreboard when Adam Files crossed from dummy half and Liam Sullivan converted.

Orrell responded with two tries, one converted, but Rovers prop Sam Files went over and Sullivan improved.

A minute from time a lovely pass from Olly Hands found Kieran Jones out wide and he put centre Parr over in the right corner.

Sullivan added a fine touchline conversion but it was just a little too late for a Rovers side who have no match this weekend.

Rovers: Liam Sullivan; Kieran Jones, Olly Parr, Niall Toher, Jay Ryder; Olly Hands, Callum Hinton; Sam Files, Adam Files, Richard Potts, Tom Fagan, Craig Rigby, Sean Millington. Subs: Andy Penny, Tom Harvey, Andy Nadin.