Beverley Braves Under 9s 4

Beverley Braves U9s produced their best performance of the season so far against a strong Wyke team when stand-out displays by James Greendale and hat-trick hero Jake Hawkins saw Beverley come away with a well earned draw.

The Braves started the game on the back foot with Wyke scoring in the corner in the first minute.

Wyke continued with the early pressure, and managed to break the Beverley defence for a second time with only five minutes gone on the clock.

This brought the introduction of Jamie Smith to the field whose strong running immediately caused problems for the Wyke defence.

A quick play the ball saw Jake Hawkins race down the wing to bring Beverley back into the game.

With Seb Edmonds’ creativity in the middle and the elusive James Greendale on the wing, Beverley went close to levelling the scores a number of times only for unforced errors to prevent them from doing so.

Wyke finished the half strongly, and despite excellent defence from the Braves, went over again and increased their lead to take Beverley into the break 3-1 down.

The second half saw the Braves off to an excellent start with both James Greendale and Jamie Smith falling a yard short of the try-line.

The Hull side responded with a number of powerful bursts only to be met by the wall-like Braves defence, denying them from increasing their lead. Strong contributions came from Aaron Darley, Kyle Cransfield and Ethan Cambridge.

The resulting hand over saw Jake Hawkins shrug off two tackles and once again race away and score with clinical efficiency.

Then from the re-start Wyke tried a different approach, spreading the ball wide, only for the ever alert James Greendale to intercept and go 40 yards downfield to level the scores 3-3.

Wyke hit back straight away to go 4-3 up with only minutes remaining but Beverley were not finished yet.

The re-start saw Jake Hawkins receive the ball and make another searing break touching down in the corner to complete his hat-trick in style.

This equalising score in the dying minutes brought a thoroughly entertaining game to an end.

Coach Neil Goforth was full of praise for the young improving side and awarded the man of the match to the whole team for their outstanding performance, which was gleefully received on behalf of the team by Matthew Wrigglesworth.