Hull Ionians 25 v 24 Chester
Star man – Lewis Minikin

The Ionians v Chester match at Brantingham Park was as close to the proverbial game of two halves as it is possible to be.
Despite the visitors taking an early lead with a penalty for James Robins it was Ionians who dominated the first period, scoring two unconverted tries from scrum-half Adam Thomas, with a trade mark dummy bought and sold to take him over from close range and lock James Newman charging over following a catch and drive from the forwards.
There should have been more, but the final pass did not match the quality of the approach work; an arcing run from fullback Sam Wilson that carved through the Chester midfield and a scintillating break from Minikin both deserved better. None the less Ionians looked the more capable outfit going into the break, leading 10- 3.
Chester piled on the pressure in the opening minutes of the second period, but the hosts broke the shackles with a raking clearance kick from Minikin taking them up into the visitors half allowing Ionians to extend the lead when winger Toni Kuku finished off a free-flowing move. Crucially, Lewis Minikin had no luck from the tee, all three conversion attempts failed by a whisker.
Chester continued to press and camped close to the home line for a prolonged period; although the aggressive Ionians defence initially drove them backwards a relentless barrage finally bore fruit with hooker Andy Baston barging over, Robins added the goal to fetch the score back to 15 – 10.
Galvanised by lively replacement scrum- half Richard Craven the fightback was on and some neat handling put winger Sean Green away to score. Robins goaled to give Chester the lead.
Ionians rallied and broke away into the Chester 22, alert to space out wide Tom Stephenson chipped into the corner for Kuku to acrobatically gather the ball and land over the line. Minikin added the goal to put Ionians 22 -17 in front.
Chester hit back with Baston claiming his second try after the visitors had pummelled away at the line, Robins added the extras and Chester believed it was job done, at 22- 24 and only two minutes remaining on the clock.
No so, Ionians are more familiar than most with this scenario, usually in the visitor’s shoes. Aware that nothing is over until the referee calls time the hosts launched one last assault. The forwards carried the ball hard at the Chester defence and won a penalty 30m from the line, many would have kicked to the corner, but Ionians elected to go for goal. Minikin, with only one previous success on the day, set the ball on the tee and cool as a cucumber dissected the uprights and Ionians celebrated to the sound of the final whistle.