Wakefield and District

Sheffield off to Winning Start in Bloodbath

City of Sheffield got their Wakefield and district league campaign off to a winning start last night with a thumping 16-6 victory over last year's champions Huddersfield. Whilst this was a comprehensive victory, the scoreline didn't really tell the whole story of a match littered with major fouls and exclusions.

This match was also particularly significant as it marked the start of Rich Rattlidge's reign as a captain and he was determined to mark his first game in style. In fact, it was reported that he even paid 4 blokes £50 each to attend the game with "Richard" banners, although Rattlidge was adamant that these were his flatmates.

The game started calmly enough with Rattlidge notching the opening goal and Sheffield building a 7-3 advantage at the end of what seemed like a very long first quarter with further goals from coach's son Elliot Kelly, Oliver Burkitt and new vice captain Tom Girling. The second quarter was an equally quiet affair with only 2 goals being scored, both by Sheffield, to give a half time score of 9-3. The large crowd (around 15) were distinctly under whelmed by the performance and young Oscar Kelly was spotted nearly asleep in the seating area.

The players must have spotted this because all hell was to break loose in the second half. A couple of minutes into the third quarter a strange noise was heard from Sheffield's very own Swiss international Oliver Otti, a regular occurrence for anyone who attends training. However, the cause of the noise this time was a punch to the face from a Huddersfield player, which promptly resulted in a exclusion for brutality, a penalty to Sheffield (duly converted by Rattlidge) and then 4 minutes of man up for Sheffield.

The man up was less than inspirational though as Sheffield managed to concede about 4 major fouls of their own (including a penalty saved by goalkeeper Alton) and one goal. They did however manage 2 more goals of their own, leaving the score at 12-4 at the end of the quarter.

The game was long over as a contest but those expecting the game to peter out in the fourth quarter were to be proved largely wrong. Rattlidge, keen to make his mark as ever, went to play pit forward and ended up in a tussle which led to both players being excluded. This was not to deter either player, as during the next Sheffield attack Rattlidge again went into the pit and got into a bit of a rumble with the same player and Olympic referee Brian Littlejohn had clearly had enough and dressing roomed both players.

However, the drama did not end there, as Huddersfield's number 5 was then excluded for brutality for punching Kelly for no apparent reason. Another penalty was awarded for the brutality, which was converted by acting captain Girling and then another 4 minute man up followed, in which time Sheffield managed to score a few more goals (mainly through the coach's son Elliot who finished with an impressive tally of 6…many long range shots from the top of the arc) and also let in a few more soft shots and the game ended 16-6.

All in all, it was a satisfactory result for Sheffield, especially as they exacted retribution for not winning this prestigious competition last year. The only sour note will be the one match suspension for captain Rattlidge, although he continued to protest his innocence after the final whistle.

The Sheffield goals were scored by Elliot Kelly (6), Oliver Burkitt (4), Tom Girling (4) and Rich Rattlidge (2).

Sheffield Suffer First Defeat of Season

Sheffield suffered their first defeat of the new Wakefield and District season as they went down 9-4 to Castleford B. It was a particularly disappointing performance from Sheffield following their impressive victory against Huddersfield in the previous game.

The pedestrian start by Sheffield players highlighted an inability to find any rhythm following a poor warm up and the first quarter ended 2-1 in favour of Castleford, a team referred to as their ‘B’ team despite being about ten times as good as their ‘A’ team and featuring a number of Great Britain junior internationals along with some Maltese bloke who was pretty good.

Sheffield upped their game slightly in the second and third quarters and going into the last quarter the score was 4 goals a piece with all to play for. However, the last quarter was a meek surrender by Sheffield, as they contrived to lose 5-0, including giving away some howlers in the process. Sheffield were not helped by a less than stellar performance from the referee which led to Rich Rattlidge and Elliott Kelly both receiving 3 major fouls but in truth the team had no-one to blame but themselves. Coach Kelly told the team in no uncertain terms how poorly they played and that a massive improvement was expected for the next match.

Sheffield Show Bounceback Ability

Only 24 hours on from their first defeat of the season to Castleford, Sheffield were given the opportunity to bounce back with their first game in the Northern League Knockout against Bridgefield.

Sheffield duly delivered in front of their home fans, sealing a comfortable 17-8 victory which could have been more but for better finishing.

As this was a Northern League competition Sheffield were boosted by the availability of Chris Armstrong (not the former professional footballer) and also continued in their policy of blooding youngsters with caps handed to George Rix, Jeremy Austin and Luke Elliott, all of whom are playing under-16 water polo this season.

Despite falling behind to an early goal Sheffield were playing well and duly established a 4-1 lead by the end of the first quarter. The goals continued to flow and were shared around amongst the team with many players getting on the scoresheet. The only thing missing was goals from the junior players but this will surely come in time as they adjust to playing senior water polo.

Sheffield’s margin of victory was impressive considering their goalkeeper, Jim Alton had injured himself in a training accident the night before (he booted a ball into the pool and shattered the bones in one of his toes) and was not properly able to tred water and therefore save shots. The amount of blood spilt by Alton over the previous 24 hours probably also left him slightly light-headed, which cannot have aided performance.

Sheffield now move onto the next round of this prestigious tournament where they are due to play the winner of the Huddersfield v Durham game in the semi final. If they come through that game then a final against Leeds or George Carpenter’s All-Star Ringer Team (Sedgefield) awaits.

…result: Durham 10 Sheffield 11.

Job done.

Results

Sheffield 16 Huddersfield 6

Sheffield 9 Castleford 4

Sheffiled 10 Durham 11