Accrington's 1st match of the new season against Swinton outfit Folly Lane got off to a tragic start when a serious injury to a Folly player delayed the match after only 2 minutes play.

When the game did restart, however, Accrington seemed least unaffected by the incident and made some good progress.

Some poor handling did result in them being forced to do a lot of tackling in the early stages, but the defence remained solid and no points conceded. When they did settle down and begin to complete their sets the first points came after 15 mins with centre Mark Brindle drawing the defence to sent in debutant winger Paul Thornton, Andy Watson being successful with the conversion 6 - 0

Folly Lane then started to find some gaps and managed to score an unconverted try down Accrington's right 6 - 4 Accrington.

The right side of Accrington's defence was again exposed and Folly took the lead with a long range effort, again unconverted

6 - 8 Folly.

A well worked set play from a scrum deep in the oppositions half resulted in Accrington re gaining the lead with fullback Danny Hinett crossing the line again it was converted by young scrum half Andy Watson. More and more pressure was now being applied as Accrington got into their stride with second row Ian Targett being unlucky to have a try disallowed for a double movement after some excellent interposing play.

The try of the match came moments later when a last tackle play saw newboy stand off Dave Makin put an excellent crossfield kick to the left which was well gathered by skipper Nick Cook, Watson again successful with the boot .18 - 8 Accrington.

With moments to go to half time Accrington again had a lapse in defence and allowed Folly to narrow the gap ,again down that right hand side. Half time score 18 - 14 to Accrington.

The second half was dominated by a big hitting defensive spell from both sides, this soon began to take its toll and midway through the half Accrington lost influential loose forward and captain Nick Cook, stunned by a heavy tackle.

Somehow managing to cling on to their slender lead, Accrington seemed to be slowly working their way to that important first win, and when that man Cook shrugged off his injury to return to the action he came up with a typical solo effort, intercepting on half way to score under the posts and with Dave Makin converting, assured victory.

It was good news for the club, that went through such traumatic times last season, they have recruited well and trained hard during the summer, lets hope the good start to the season continues for them.

Team:

Hinett,Steele,B Dawber, Brindle, Thornton, Makin, Watson, Meeks, Wrigley, Kynaston, Targett, Rickles, Cook.

Subs(all used) Fay,Hindle,S Dawber.