York topple top of the table Leeds

Breakthrough: Brown gets past the Leeds defence

A reworked back line paired Danny Stacey and Nick Brown for the first time, with the idea of keeping the ball alive and relying on sending it wide early to stretch the Leeds defence.

York came out of the blocks flying, putting early pressure on and giving Leeds a fright that it didn’t look like they were expecting. With only five minutes gone, York sent Stacey up the middle and quick ruck ball was sent out to Tom Benbow, who made a half break through the Leeds back line. Brown then came onto the ball with pace and fly-half Benbow made a slick offload to send Brown one-on-one with the full-back. A swerve and Brown sent York 5-0 up after only five minutes.

Indiscipline on Leeds' part kept the pressure on them, but although York were continually breaking the line, pressure was not turned into points. York then made the same mistakes that had continually blighted their opponents to gift Leeds an easy kick to pull 3 points back.

York continued naively giving away some silly penalties, and only last ditch defence was saving Leeds from converting their pressure into scores. Finally indiscipline mixed with poor tackling allowed the Leeds winger to score an easy try as two York tackles fell off and Leeds took a 10-5 lead following an easy conversion.

York then came back at Leeds. Key to this was quick tap penalties and not allowing Leeds to get re-organised after their own indiscipline. Eventually York pressure told and loose play led to the ball ending up in Brown's hands, who again broke tackles and swerved on his run in on the Leeds full-back to complete his brace and bring York back to 10 all.

Leeds came back again and York indiscipline offered another simple penalty. However, foul language by the Leeds prop directed at the referee resulted in the penalty being overturned and him being sent to the sin bin.

Half-time came and York flew out of the blocks again as they had in the first half, intent on making their extra man count. York put phases together and ended up with clean ball in the centre of the pitch. Enterprising work by James Wilson and Sam Stoddart on the left wing set up York close to the right hand corner try-line. Quick ball ended up in Stacey’s hands on the left wing and he broke through his tackler to end his try drought and put York back into the lead, with Warwick Van Der Burrows adding the extras to make it 17-10.

Contrasting emotions: York victory and Leeds defeat

With Leeds returning to their full compliment the game tightened up again and only Leeds indiscipline got the scoreboard ticking over, with two Van Der Burrows penalties leaving the score at 23-10.

With only 10 minutes left York were on the verge of a huge victory, but were clearly the less fit team. With Leeds realising this, they came back all cylinders firing to attempt to save their undefeated record. York were hanging on by their fingertips and it was only pure grit that was stopping the tide turning. However with Leeds moving the ball around well and holes beginning to appear, a score seemed inevitable. Eventually after a series of rucks, the Leeds number 8 broke the line to send the winger over to score, and with a converted kick Leeds pulled themselves back to 23-17.

The final few moments were excruciatingly tense, but York clung on to claim a major victory on the road to promotion. Captain Paul Goodall said: “It was far and away the biggest victory I’ve had in my time playing for the white rose.”

Full-back James Wilson echoed his captain's words and added: “It is essential that this victory isn’t a one-off and we build on this to ensure we are still competitive in the league come the new year.” With more performances like this one, York could be the dark horse in the race for promotion.

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