The first half was marred by a succession of mistakes from both teams. Huddersfield were first to score, when Danny Arnold crossed on 17 mins. He caught the Hull markers asleep at a play-the-ball and forced his way over despite Gary Lester, Brad Hepi and Steve Craven hanging from him. The Sharks came back with two penalties from Steve Prescott, but these were nullified by two from Paul Cook, late in the first half.

The Giants held a 4-10 advantage at halftime, but neither coach would have been happy at their team's performance. The game, as a spectacle, was being spoiled by referee Kirkpatrick's reluctance to properly police the play-the-ball area. Instances of laying all over the tackled player, stealing the ball in more than one-on-one tackles and interfering with the tackled player were commonplace.

With the words of coach Peter Walsh ringing in their ears, the Sharks got their game together at the start of the second half and their first try was not long in coming. A great run down the left flank by Logan Campbell looked to be covered by the Giants' defence, but amazingly, they stood off him. Campbell shimmied and dummied his way towards the line and Matt Sturm missed the final tackle. Prescott hit a good conversion from just inside the touchline and the scores were tied up at 10-10.

Jeff Witenberg was despatched for a spell in the sin-bin on 49 mins, as Kirkpatrick patience with play-the-ball offences expired, but the Sharks could not take advantage of the extra man. They did hit the front on 62 mins, when they threw the ball out to the left from a scrum in mid-field. Craig Weston missed the tackle on Campbell and he set off towards the line and passed outside to Mark Johnson, for the winger to touchdown.

A field goal from Craig Murdock stretched the Sharks lead to 15-10 and they stitched up the game on 72 mins, with their third try. It came from another break by Campbell down the left wing and this time it was Gary Lester who took the final pass to cross under the posts.

Man of the Match, by the proverbial country mile, was Sharks' centre Logan Campbell, for they would have been a very poor team indeed, without him. After the turmoil during the week at Huddersfield, their players did nothing that stand-in coach Phil Veivers would be proud of. They had three weeks in which to prepare for this game and if this is the best that they can come up with, then perhaps they should all follow the example of Garry Schofield and resign en-bloc.

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©1998, Richard Bailey, Matthew Webb