BRADFORD BULLS 36 SHEFFIELD EAGLES 20
KEITH McGHIE, Bartercard Odsal, Sunday
FIVE second-half tries helped overturn an early deficit and leave Bradford standing just 80 minutes away from a first appearance at Wembley since 1997.
The five-times Challenge Cup winners, twice this century but in Edinburgh and Cardiff, looked slightly lost as the fluency evident the previous week at Featherstone seemed to evade them until they finally got off the mark when Nathan Mason pounced on the stroke of half-time.
Sheffield, the inaugural 1895 Cup winners in 2019 and runners-up last year, looked the more likely side to progress for much of the first period but, for the second week running, squandered an eight-point lead.
“I thought we helped them (get ahead) but we rectified it,” pointed out a pleased but not totally satisfied Bulls coach Brian Noble. “The good thing about half-time is that you get to change things, and we did.”
Bradford fielded the 17 who were so impressive in scoring nine tries at Featherstone.
Sheffield, whose recollections of letting slip that eight-point lead at home to Oldham in the same Championship round were less happy, made loan signings in the week with Warrington’s Sam Marshall and Joe Bajer handed debuts from the bench.
More than half of the Sheffield matchday squad had, at some stage of their careers, spent time at Bradford and one of those – Cory Aston – sprayed a long pass out for another – Matty Dawson-Jones – to dive over wide out and open the scoring.
Aston converted and swift inter-passing down centrefield earned the visitors most of the early field position.
Midway through the first half, a Blake Broadbent break was only stopped by desperate defence that resulted in a penalty for a high tackle, which Aston goaled, and for which Luke Hooley was shown a yellow card.
The sequential introduction of the bench gave Bradford notable extra impetus but there was no further scoring until right on half-time, when Mason barged his way over beside the posts and Hooley, now back on, converted to turn wide open a game which Sheffield had hitherto largely controlled.
After the break an early penalty gave Bulls a position from where Jordan Lilley sent Mason crashing through, again from close range, to edge the hosts ahead. Hooley goaled.
Soon after Lilley successfully chased his own kick in-goal and, with Hooley again improving, previously less-than-convincing Bradford were in command.
On 54 minutes, a scuffle broke out after a holding-down incident, and Bradford’s Sam Hallas and Sheffield’s Evan Hodgson were both sent to the sin bin.
Hooley kicked a penalty-goal for 20-8, but with more space to move in, Dawson-Jones grabbed his second try of the game, and Aston’s third goal narrowed the gap to six points.
However a Joe Keyes kick was claimed by Jayden Okunbor, although Hooley’s touchline kick went wide – his only miss – and Bradford again had breathing space.
Then the unlikely figure of Franklin Pele burst clear down the left wing and Kieran Gill was on hand to nudge Bulls even closer to the semi-finals with a converted score.
Matty Gee ran in another try late on and Hooley added his sixth goal before Sheffield’s Alex Foster claimed a late consolation which Jack Mallinson improved.
GAMESTAR: Bradford playmaker Jordan Lilley’s introduction injected much-needed urgency and direction.
GAMEBREAKER: Three late Bulls tries left Sheffield too big a mountain to climb.
MATCHFACTS
BULLS
26 Luke Hooley
37 Jayden Okunbor
3 Waqa Blake
4 Kieran Gill
5 Guy Armitage
6 James Meadows
7 Joe Keyes
8 Michael Lawrence
14 Mitch Souter
17 Franklin Pele
11 Zac Fulton
12 Matty Gee
13 James Donaldson
Subs (all used)
9 Jordan Lilley
16 Nathan Mason
18 Sam Hallas
20 Ronan Michael
Tries: Mason (40, 44), Lilley (47), Okunbor (61), Gill (63), Gee (72)
Goals: Hooley 6/7
Sin bin: Hooley (21) – high tackle; Hallas (54) – fighting
EAGLES
26 Jack Walker
21 Ryan Millar
3 Kris Welham
23 Alex Foster
5 Matty Dawson-Jones
6 Cory Aston
7 Morgan Smith
16 Blake Broadbent
14 Reiss Butterworth
10 Tyler Dickinson
24 Oliver Roberts
15 Evan Hodgson
13 Titus Gwaze
Subs (all used)
27 Jack Mallinson
22 Masi Matongo
35 Joe Bajer
36 Sam Marshall
Tries: Dawson-Jones (8, 58), Foster (80)
Goals: Aston 3/3, Mallinson 1/1
Sin bin: Hodgson (54) – fighting
SCORING SEQUENCE: 0-6, 0-8, 6-8; 12-8, 18-8, 20-8, 20-14, 24-14, 30-14, 36-24, 36-20
Rugby Leaguer & League Express Men of the Match
Bulls: Jordan Lilley; Eagles: Titus Gwaze
Penalty count: 7-6
Half-time: 6-8
Referee: Matty Lynn
Attendance: 1,606