19th January  2008 - Leicester Lions 38  Hull Ionians 14 - National 3 North     pictures

Hull Ionians were always going to have a challenge up against second placed promotion chasing Leicester Lions who were determined to maintain their unbeaten home record and away defeat early in the season. The first half saw Hull Ionians living off just 3 crumbs of possession and scoring from one of them to at least keep themselves in the game, but the Lions eventually ran out comfortable winners with a flattering victory score line.

As Hull Ionians struggled to get to the ball it was inevitable they conceded too many penalties and two in the first two minutes set up Jon Boden to take 3 points. Hull Ionians tenacious defence was giving nothing away until a yellow card gave Lions the extra man. The penalty was kicked for an attacking line-out and hooker John Williamson was driven over for the try. Hull Ionians attacked from the next line-out and when the ball was knocked loose in the tackle James Greene was in close support and pounced on it and raced clear to score with James Ferguson adding the goal. However the Lions struck straight back helped by a clearly forward pass that put Scott Alfeld through the gap to send in Gareth Collins for the try, Boden converting and adding a penalty to lead 18-7. Hull Ionians closed the half driving from the 22 to the line with the Lions flanker 3 times coming offside to try and stop it, which he finally did. The yellow card was inevitable but unusually James Ferguson’s penalty kick went wide.

Hull Ionians fired up to start the second half with the Lions flanker off and deservedly scored. A half break and chip ahead by Joe Donkin forced a 5 metre scrum then neat play by James Ferguson put Travis Plumridge through for a try, Ferguson converting and trailing just 18-14 playing down the hill they were back in the match. However the Lions were now back to full strength with Hull Ionians having a 2^nd yellow for offside conceding a simple penalty goal to Jon Boden. Then lost possession was punished with Williamson dancing through the defence to score, Boden converting then adding another penalty. Mick Watson was then put through for a try in identical manner to the Lions second try, but this time it was quite correctly disallowed for the forward pass. As both sides pushed for more tries another dropped pass saw Jon Boden kick through to score and convert his own bonus point try in injury time.