Saturday 16th March – 1st XV Away to Leeds Tykes

Lymm head over the Pennines again on Saturday, this time to face unbeaten League leaders, Leeds Tykes at the West Park Leeds ground, KO 3:00.  In the reverse fixture at Lymm in November, Tykes put on a sumptuous first half performance to go into the break 33-0 ahead with the try bonus point secured.  Whilst Lymm did fare much better afterwards, winning the second half 21-10, the die had been cast in that first 40.  Following the excellent win last Saturday against a big, physical Hull side, Lymm will hope for a much better start to the match than they managed in November.

With the season now entering its final stanza, nerves at the foot and top of the table will no doubt be showing.  Lymm will feel they need to pick up a couple of wins out of the last 5 matches to assure National League rugby next season; whilst, at the top, the title is likely to rest on next week’s encounter between the top two teams, when Tykes travel to Rotherham.

With 5 teams being relegated from the 3 National 2 Leagues this season (due to the need to replace the disbanded Jersey Reds in the Championship) the second bottom team with the best record (out of the three) will be reprieved and stay put.  Hence, this season, in addition to looking up and down your own league, there is an additional dimension such that a weather eye needs to be kept on what is going on in the other 2 leagues.  As things stand after 21 rounds, the competition for that reprieve seems likely to be a close shoot-out between Lymm’s League (North) and National League East.  More nail biting in prospect no doubt….

Looking at the level below National League North, it seems that, following their win at Blackburn last time out, Macclesfield are, barring something unpredictable, destined for promotion from the North West league.  However, the position on the other side of the Pennines could not be more different with 4 teams – York, Heath, Harrogate and Driffield separated by a mere 3 points with 3 matches left.