York City Knights 12-30 Featherstone Rovers: Player ratings and major talking points

Rugby League’s maiden voyage on Premier Sports got off to an interesting start as both York City Knights and Featherstone Rovers treated us all to a thrilling contest as the Championship returned in style. Ultimately, ‘Fev saw off a resilient York side 30-12 at the LNER Community stadium in the opening round of the Championship.

Talking Points:

1. Are Featherstone Rovers the real deal?

Despite having so many out, including losing Jesse Sene-Lefao to a serious arm injury after just seven minutes, Featherstone regrouped and produced some thrilling rugby league football to help claim a crucial win. Jack Teanby starred in a man of the match performance, claiming a try for good measure, but there were plenty of faces who stood out on a memorable night for the visitors. The win clearly demonstrates their tenacity as a team as they were able to overcome any issues with their absentees to defeat one of their promotion rivals. Perhaps a statement of intent from the ‘flat cappers’ that they are the team to beat this season.

2. Fatigue factor an issue for the Knights

Taking nothing away from Featherstone but the fatigue factor ultimately showed for York. The Knights had ‘Fev at 12-6 during the second half but the visitors showed their superiority and capitalised on York’s tiring defending with a further three tries late on. In fairness, they had their own fair share of absentees, with two half-backs in Liam Harris and Brendan O’Hagan missing but Featherstone looked the fitter and stronger throughout the contest. Early days but perhaps the match demonstrates that York are not quite ready to challenge for promotion.

3. Loose-forwards key

The highest rated players of either side tonight, funnily enough, were the loose-forwards. Teanby was the official player of the match but Jordan Thompson of York was equally impressive. Arguably, the latter did not deserve to be on the losing side and even though many have criticised the contribution a loose-forward gives to the game these days, both produced some exciting attacking rugby with ball in hand and produced plenty of metres.

Player Ratings:

York City Knights
22. Myles Harrison – 6
2. Joe Brown – 7
3. James Glover – 7
25. Jack Logan – 6
5. Ross Oakes – 7
1. Matty Marsh – 7
7. Jamie Ellis – 7
8. Masi Matongo – 5
9. Will Jubb – 7
24. Ronan Michael – 6
11. Chris Clarkson – 6
17. Danny Kirmond – 6
13. Jordan Thompson – 8
Substitutes
10. Jack Teanby – 7
12. Pauli Pauli – 6
16. Marcus Stock – 6
20. Kriss Brining – 6

Featherstone Rovers
1. Brandon Pickersgill – 8
2. Luke Briscoe – 8
18. Josh Hardcastle – 7
4. Craig Hall – 8
5. Gareth Gale – 6
6. Tom Holmes – 7
20. Morgan Smith – 7
21. Luke Cooper – 6
14. Matty Wildie – 7
10. James Lockwood – 7
16. Junior Moors – 7
12. Jesse Sene-Lefao – 4
13. Jack Teanby – 9
Substitutes
9. Connor Jones – 7
15. John Davies – 7
19. Callum Field – 7
22. Kyle Trout – 6