West Park are defeated by the atrocious conditions

Mar 31 2008 by Staff Copytaker, Liverpool Daily Post

WEST Park’s hopes of moving away from the National Three North relegation zone, by defeating the side immediately above them, were postponed rather painfully on Saturday due to the weather.

After a closely contested and rather tricky first half, which ended with centre Adam Clover in the sin bin, the match had to be called off after the resumption, due to an injury suffered by visiting full-back James Hewitt.

Hewitt lost his footing on the increasingly slippery surface and damaged his leg so badly that he will be out of action for the season.

Referee Revis Phillips had already warned both teams at the interval that the playing conditions were deteriorating fast and the game might have to be abandoned. Understandably, he had no hesitation in doing just that as Hewitt crashed to the ground with torn muscles which will require a surgery.

Fortunately, next Saturday is a free date at present and the indications are that the game will be replayed then, provided the pitch has recovered and nothing else more urgent has turned up.

The way things had gone before the abandonment was fairly mixed, with West Park starting well but then making a number of mistakes that cost them points.

Despite playing into quite a strong breeze, they took the lead with a good penalty from Andy Soutar after 12 minutes, but then were pushed back to their own line to concede a try to Ian Judson, that Tom Rhodes converted.

Play, generally, was very even and a second penalty from Soutar brought West Park within a point before Adam Glover was sin binned and Tom Rhodes added a penalty while he was off the pitch.

Both sides had moments before Hewitt’s injury, but West Park can gain a vital success if they learn lessons from this erratic encounter.

WEST PARK: Turner; Soutar, Cunliffe, Glover, Williams; Ryan, Anderson; Devine, Gibney, Critchley, March, Marshall, Bonati, Williams, Smithson. Replacements: Higham, Westhead, Hitchmough, Conning.