York 34 Bradford and Bingley 20

THERE was an abundance of open running rugby from both sides, but it was hosts York who emerged as comfortable winners over Bradford and Bingley in their North One East clash, wrapping the game up after a dominant first half display.

The visiting Bees did not seem to have an answer to a lively home backline and solid pack which kept them largely on defensive duties for most of the first half.

The pattern was set in the fourth minute where a Bees player missed his defensive assignment in midfield and the home backs whipped the ball out to the left wing.

Gareth Singleton was on hand to scamper round the final Bees defender from out wide to open the scoring, with Jonathan Dawes tacking on the extras.

Eight minutes later and the visitors were left admiring another Dawes conversion, this time from a Shane Goulding score.

Most of the Bees play was outside the home 22 and was defended without too much concern by the home side and on 28 minutes, matters got worse for them.

Centre George Davis sliced through some poor defence to stretch the home advantage to 21-0, after Dawes landed his third conversion.

Then, the York scrum half found himself free with nobody to stop him crossing the line and it was 26-0 with half-time looming over the horizon.

The Bees finally upped their game and were now looking more like themselves. The ball started to be shipped around by the backs and the forwards started to move the pile of defenders round the mauls back towards the home line.

Right on half-time, Thomas Bacon got the ball close to the line and powered over to the left of the posts to make it 26-5 as the sides turned round.

The Bees began the second half with more purpose than they had for most of the first period and on 47 minutes, Lance Taylor slid over to make it 26-10.

The momentum of the game was starting to go with the visitors, but a penalty from Dawes and then a try from Daniel Coe stretched the home side's lead out to 24 points.

This left the Bees realistically just in the hunt for bonus points. Taylor moved into scrum half as the visiting backline hunted for the two tries that were needed.

York defended well but Cameron Bainbridge made the breakthrough that the visitors had been looking for with five minutes remaining in the contest.

Taylor did not attempt to make the conversion as he made an effort to speed things up. By this point, the game, if not the scoreboard, had swung in the visitors' favour.

The Bees ended the half much as they had finished the first and were rewarded with a second score for Taylor, who zipped over to left of the posts to claim that consolation bonus point.