Saturday sees the battle of the roses take place at Fylde when Lancashire take on Yorkshire in the RFU County Championship, the game kicks off at 3pm. All 7 Hoppers lads who featured for the county in last week’s fixture against Durham are once again selected. Hooker Phil Mills comes into the starting lineup whilst Phil Baines drops to the bench. Gareth Gore, Ally Murray, Dominic Moon, Jack Ward and Sean Taylor retain their starting places. Good luck lads!
Hoppers Lancashire contingent, (L-R) Jack Ward, Dominic Moon, Gareth Gore, Ally Murray, Phil Baines, Phil Mills, Sean Taylor (Photo courtesy of Rod Murray)
Lancashire RFU’s press release
This Saturday’s roses encounter sees the availability of the Fylde contingent of players, after the conclusion of the National One season.
Six changes to the starting line-up from last weekend’s win at Hartlepool against Durham sees a wholesale change in the front row, with Dan Birchall and Pete Altham in to prop Phil Mills, who replaces Johnny Matthews, a late call-up to the England Counties Under 20 squad for their tour in Georgia.
Ryan De la Harpe brings more experience to the scrum-half position, while Chris Briers starts at outside centre. The rest of the team remains from those who lined up against Durham, while the bench sees further changes with Simon Griffiths, Evan Stewart and Chris Johnson joining Tom Webb from the Woodlands outfit.
Jon Nugent of French club Stade Dijon takes his place among the replacements. The former Liverpool St. Helens, Waterloo and Caldy flanker is a previous Bill Beaumont Cup winner with Lancashire before his move to France.
Manager Steve Rigby said of the changes “Although we had a massive selection headache last week with three clubs still playing league fixtures, this time around the availability of the Fylde players had given us a different kind of selection problem.”
The line-up for Saturday’s game is –
15 Sean Taylor (Preston Grasshoppers) 14 Nick Royle (Vale of Lune) 13 Chris Briers (Fylde) 12 Jack Ward (Preston Grasshoppers) 11 Andrew Riley (Sedgley Park) 10 Steve Collins (Sedgley Park) 9 Ryan De La Harpe (Fylde); 1 Dan Birchall (Fylde) 2 Phil Mills (Preston Grasshoppers) 3 Pete Altham (Fylde) 4 Louis McGowan (Sedgley Park) (c) 5 Gareth Gore (Preston Grasshoppers) 6 Alistair Murray (Preston Grasshoppers) 7 Steve McGinnis (Fylde) 8 Dominic Moon (Preston Grasshoppers)
Replacements –
16 Simon Griffiths (Fylde) 17 Jon Nugent (Stade Dijon) 18 Mark Rylance (Caldy) 19 Evan Stewart (Fylde) 20 Philip Baines (Preston Grasshoppers) 21 Tom Webb (Fylde) 22 Chris Johnson (Fylde)
