Huddersfield’s talented centre, Chris Johnson, scored all their points with three penalties, a try and a conversion in the first half and a further penalty in the second half.

Harrogate’s young wing threequarter, Joe Rowntree opened the scoring with a penalty in front of the posts after three minutes. Johnson replied with two penalties for Huddersfield.

After twenty minutes Huddersfield intercepted a Harrogate move in the middle of the park against the run of play. Johnson chased the kick ahead and skilfully picked up the ball to score under the posts and added the conversion.

Harrogate always looked more dangerous than Huddersfield when they had possession and after thirty minutes, from a ruck in midfield, the ball was quickly recycled and moved to the right. Harrogate hooker Aarin Yorke had the pace to outflank the defence for a well constructed try wide on the right which was unconverted.

Tony Stringwell, the Huddersfield prop was yellow carded with eight minutes of the first half remaining and Harrogate took advantage with a move directly from the training manual. Harrogate second row James Spencer was dominating the lineouts and provided quality possession from a lineout on the right. The ball was moved quickly along the back line. Centre Steve Parsons is always looking for the break and when it came, full back Ed Smithies was on hand to finish a flowing move with a splendid try for Joe Rowntree to convert in front of the posts. With a half time score of 16 – 15 to Huddersfield both teams had plenty to play for in the second half.

Jonathan McMillan replaced the injured prop Simon Davies just before half time and Dan Harland was replaced by Steve Hewetson early in the second half.

Harrogate scrum half Phil Wickham and fly half Dickie Davies provided excellent distribution, which combined with probing runs from No. 8 Ryan Peacey , flanker Tim Heaton, second row Jacob Brady and centre Kyle Dench to give the edge that was needed to secure the result.

Within three minutes of the restart Harrogate forced a lineout close to the Huddersfield line. Spencer collected the ball in the lineout and Harrogate attempted a driving maul followed by individual efforts from Davies and Smithies but when the ball was passed wide it was that man Parsons again who burst through the defence for another crowd pleasing try converted by Rowntree.

Johnson and Rowntree exchanged another penalty each to complete the scoring with a 25 – 19 victory for Harrogate.

Harrogate team: Ed. Smithies, Joe Rowntree, Steve Parsons, Kyle Dench, Chris Harris (Mike Aspinall 70 mins.), Dickie Davies, Phil Wickham, Ben Sowrey, Aarin Yorke (Ed Spackman 70 mins), Simon Davies (Jonathan McMillan 38 mins), James Spencer, Jacob Brady, Tim Heaton, Dan Harland (Steve Hewetson 40 mins), Ryan Peacey. Replacement: Max Lewis.

Huddersfield team: Tom Owen, James Wood, Chris Johnson, Ben Paxman, Adam Sutcliffe, Chris Duffy, Joel HInchcliff, Sam Slater, James Davies, Tony Stringwell, Gavin Rhodes, Ben Harris, Nick Sharpe (Captain), GarethLewis, Dan Hyde. Replacements: Alex Battye, Jack McPhail, George Hinchcliffe, Mark Whitehead, Damian Clayton.

Referee: Steve Penfold

Report by Brian Forshaw