SIMON SMITH: Scarborough RUFC disappointment at Pocklington defeat

Playing into the wind in the first half was always going to be difficult and as a consequence for the first 15 minutes we were camped on our line, but throughout this period we defended superbly to prevent Pocklington scoring.

Eventually we turned the tables and scoring a well-constructed try on the right with Manning Smith feeding Jimmy Perrett to score under the posts.

Unfortunately our ill-discipline led to two yellow cards during the first period, which allowed Pocklington to take advantage and score an unconverted try.

However, we felt with a 7-5 half-time lead and the elements in our favour we could go on and win the game.

The second half began disastrously for us with one of our players receiving a second yellow card just a minute after returning to the field for what I believe was an offside decision just inside our half.

With 14 men, this was always going to be hard and losing another player to a yellow card 10 minutes later didn’t help matters and as you might expect Pocklington now began to dictate play.

The final nail in the coffin was a second red card with about 10 minutes to go.

As such we played most of the second half with 13 men and against a quality side like Pocklington, and eventually they are going to exploit the space, which they did in the final 10 minutes when the team was obviously tired.

We will now have two men facing disciplinary hearings in the near future, where we hope Scarborough’s previous good conduct will be taken into consideration.

This comes at a bad time for us, especially when we have Nino Cutino, Tom Harrison and Matty Young already out with injuries.

It is important that we learn from this game as a team, coaching staff and club as I felt at times, myself included, let ourselves down on Saturday.

I am however confident that we can bounce back with a performance that will make us all proud.

We have a rest this week, before a difficult trip to Driffield next Saturday.

Despite losing ground on leaders Morpeth, who hammered Bridlington 53-5, Huddersfield YMCA suffered a surprise defeat at home to West Leeds, which means we keep the gap to them to eight points.

We have a long, long way to go and any talk of a play-off is premature as we have a number of hard fixtures, including a trip to Morley.