Keighley Cougars wallop West Wales Raiders in Pride game

On the club’s third annual pride event, Rhys Lovegrove’s side ran in sixteen tries, Jack Miller adding 11 conversions, while also keeping a second consecutive clean sheet.

The Cougars opened the scoring inside the game’s opening three minutes as they exposed the Raiders left edge and sent Miller racing over on the back of a flowing move down the pitch.

Junior Sa’u was then held short of the line on the fifth tackle, but the side opted against kicking and shifted the ball across the field to Nathan Roebuck, who forced his way over.

West Wales held out defensively for a while, but Keighley extended their lead through Mo Agoro who touched down in the right corner.

And on the back of a scrum, Dane Chisholm weaved through two defenders to touch the ball down.

Keighley again opted to play the ball on the last tackle and were rewarded, as with the visitors’ defensive line bent out of shape, Jake Webster rounded to race over the line.

Just before the interval, Lewis Young dotted down after Chisholm opened up the West Wales defence with a break down the field.

The second half saw an onslaught as the Cougars ran in 11 tries.

Sa’u powered his way in at the corner to being the free-scoring second 40 minutes.

Three minutes later, Roebuck broke the line and shifted the ball inside to Webster, who raced over for his second.

A piece of individual brilliance by Agoro kept the scoreboard ticking over, the winger cutting inside and breaking through three attempted tackles to dive over.

Two tries in two minutes through Charlie Graham soon followed.

The centre first broke through a tackle and raced 80 metres, much to the delight of the Cougars faithful, before from the restart, he took a pass from Chisholm and again raced the length of the field.

With West Wales under the pump, Agoro completed his hat-trick as he powered over on the back of a scrum that allowed Chisholm to take on the line.

Another restart led to a penalty that allowed the Cougars to make 70 metres up the field.

And from the tap, Sa’u offloaded out the tackle to Aaron Levy, which allowed the back-rower to crash his way over.

Agoro then scored his fourth of the afternoon, carrying two West Wales defenders over the line from close range after Chisholm produced an outrageous piece of skill.

West Wales then has a rare period of possession, but were held up over the line on the last tackle.

From the turnover, the Cougars again went the length of the field.

With the Raiders defensive line again on the backfoot, Chisholm took on the line and shifted the ball outside to Levy, who stepped through a tackle and sprinted over for his second try of the afternoon.

The Cougars registered their final score of the game with five minutes left on the clock.

A tired West Wales defence was opened up once again by Chisholm, the half-back racing nearly the full length of the field before offloading to the supporting Roebuck, who walked the ball home.