Stanley produce their most disappointing result of the season in dreadful conditions losing out to a methodical Saddleworth 52-6 at Shaw Hall Bank.

The Rangers started brightly despite the lopsided final scoreline and the Stanley men will be dreaming of what ‘could have been’, had early pressure yielded the correct results. Stanley started very promisingly with props Grice and Man of the Match David Brown making early in roads into the hosts’ defence, a nice early shift play from Liam Crawley found Daniel Grice who chipped over the blitzing defence but the leaping Jake Ware was unable to gather to touchdown in the corner. Stanley defended aggressively and had the home team struggling to return the ball from their own line. Tough defence from Crawley and Ackroyd disrupted the Saddleworth attack in the middle of the field and a dropped pass was hacked forwarded by debutant Rob Fox who narrowly missed out on touching down as the ball held up just short in the deluged ground. 

In spite of Stanley’s early dominance it was Saddleworth that struck first, in dubious circumstances, a strong one up carry to the left of the sticks led to the home team forward being awarded the four pointer, despite seemingly being held up. This seemed to encourage the home side who lifted the intensity and methodically attacked down their left edge. Centre Jack Ledger continued his strong development this season getting through a mountain of tackling, ably assisted by Fox, Rice and Ware. However, the weight of possession and position allowed Saddleworth to cross 3 more times before the break giving the half time score of 24-0. 
The Second half started with show improvement after a rousing speech from Gary Lord, the Stanley men once again took up the fight in the middle of the field, Richard Cattley, Rob Fox and David Brown were taking them over the gain line time after time. A well timed pass from Danny Grice sent Joel Marsh through a gap but unfortunately could not find any support. 

As with the first half the early Stanley dominance was short lived and the more composed home team persisted with their game plan and found a number of gaps in the tiring Stanley defensively line. A pair of quick soft tries pulled the visitors further behind giving the score line a more lopsided feel than the performances would suggest. 

Stanley managed to rally and gave a solid mid-half performance with Hartley, Brown, Crawley and Grice powering the side forward in the middle. Setting the platform for Ackroyd, Danny Grice and Jordan Rice to move the ball out wide for debutant Rob Fox to power over in the corner, with Grice adding the conversion. 
Unfortunately this try didn’t spark an away team comeback and Saddleworth came straight back with 2 more tries to end the game 52-6 winners. Stanley will be very disappointed with their performance on the day, given the bright start to the season so far. This is a new a developing group of players that will now look forward to tough home derby against Thornhill Trojans next week, where they will strive to put right, ‘the wrongs’ of this weekend.