Bolton U15's succumbed to their heaviest defeat of the season so far losing to a strong Liverpool St Helens side.
With several key players missing due to injury it was always going to be a tough fixture against strong Pool A competition.

Bolton have landed themselves in this Pool after success in a cup run last year saw them seeded against the top clubs in the Northwest.

With Dan Southworth still out injured, Morgan Skeels-Caldwell just returning from injury, Tom Crook (fractured thumb) and Zak Grundy (broken collar bone) all unable to play apart from Morgan it was a mountain to climb.

Both teams were well matched from the beginning with each other testing for strengths and weaknesses. LSH opened the scoring after 12 minutes when their well drilled back line spotted weaknesses in the Bolton tackling and went over to score.
LSH then went on to score every two to three minutes making the score at half time 0 v 24.

The best chance of the first half for Bolton to score was when Josh Grundy made a break on the right wing and the ball was fed inside and supported by Owen Patel and after a good ruck under the LSH posts Elvis Majanja was fed by Ben Turner close to the LSH try line but Elvis got held up over the try line by LSH's stocky winger.

Changes at half time moved Milo Holmes to number 9, Abdullah Hussein came on for Harry Dawber for only his second game, Morgan Skeels-Caldwell came into the back row for Milo, and Tom Knights-Rigler swapped with Elvis Majanja.

These changes seemed to spur Bolton on for a short while with Bolton taking the rucking supremacy away from LSH. The scrum appeared steadier. But it was the away side who scored first again through their back line who were dominating the game.

0 v 29. Bolton however rallied round and pressure in the LSH 22 led to Sam Dawson forcing his hand through a melee to score over the whitewash. James Evans narrowly missed the conversion. 5 v 29 Bolton bravely fended off attack after attack from LSH and but for the last minute tackling from full back James Evans the score could have been a lot greater.

Ben Turner's jinking runs were causing the LSH defence all types of problems one such run saw him put Sam Dawson through again but Sam just couldn't get the room to escape the LSH defence.

LSH went onto score 3 more tries without reply, a convincing win for the away team.
Ben Turner was awarded the Player of the match award, with Alex Greenhalgh receiving the best tackler award and Milo Holmes picked up most contribution award for starting on the back row and moving to 9 in the second half.

It's proving to be a tough old time in Pool A this season not helped by all our injured players, the next two league games this year are both away v Preston Grasshoppers and Fylde.