Rotherham ended their pre-season campaign with a disappointing 22-19 defeat to Wharfedale at the picturesque, but at times wet and windy setting of The Avenue.
The loss is a set-back for the South Yorkshire side following their opening warm-up game seven days earlier which saw them convincingly beat Preston Grasshoppers. Titans will need to regroup quickly in the week ahead as they prepare to open their National 1 campaign with a visit to Rosslyn Park next Saturday.
However, few in the ground would have predicted the final outcome after 28 minutes of an entertaining contest; as during that opening spell Rotherham raced into a 19-0 lead following three tries from Dan Leake, Harry Dunne and Sam Hollingsworth.
Maybe that was the problem for the Clifton Lane side, maybe up to that point it had become all too easy as their hard work, both in attack and defence had been so very impressive.
However, as Rotherham found out 12 months ago, Wharfedale do not roll over at home and if you are going to beat them at The Avenue you have to put your game together for more than half an hour.
So full credit to the home side for continuing to graft hard and although they enjoyed some favourable decisions at key moments, their endeavours saw them cross the whitewash twice before the break to draw to within 5 points.
The second half saw Titans start brightly and they enjoyed long periods inside the hosts 22. Unfortunately for them however they were unable to breach the whitewash; tenacious defending from the Green Machine, combined with plenty of ‘old school’ slowing the ball down paid tremendous dividends.
On the hour mark ‘Dale drew level when they scored their third try of the match to set-up a tense final 20. Rotherham did have their moments in the latter stages, but on 80 minutes the hosts were awarded a penalty in front of the posts which they eagerly converted to wrap-up a game Titans couldn’t quite believe they’d lost.
Commenting post-game Titans’ Director of Rugby, Martin Jenkinson, explained, “I think Wharfedale are a good outfit who are very well drilled by Jon Skurr and Jon Feeley and on their own patch they are always very difficult to beat. We’re not trying to make excuses, but we have lots of new boys and lots of work-ons, but the good thing is you can see where we were breasking down and those things can be fixed.
“Obviously time is short before Rosslyn Park next Saturday and we know that’s going to be a massively difficult trip and we will need to regroup quickly.
“The thing which pleased us was the individual stuff. We’ve got some very good players with some very good physicality, but we need to bring that together into a cohesive unit and we need to play sensible rugby in the right areas of the park.
“If you look at the two Wharfedale scores in the first half, they both came about when we didn’t exit when we had the opportunity to do so. We must give all opposition the respect they deserve and play solid rugby at all times.
“There will always be work-ons and time is short in the environment we’ve got, but I’ve got every confidence in the squad we’ve got. I don’t believe that one result changes all the thought processes we’ve had through the summer; I believe we are knowledgeable about the game and I believe this squad will perform and be competitive all the way through the season.”
