YORK RI took first blood in the newly formed North Yorkshire Challenge under-18s Floodlit Competition with an 8-15 win over rivals Selby.

The 14-team programme has been dreamt up to promote under-18s rugby union and is played at the few floodlit venues in the area, such as Northallerton and York RI.

Selby visited York RI in their first encounter and took the lead with a Simon Tomlinson try after he broke through from a maul on the 22 for a 5-0 half time lead.

Dan Porter added a penalty after the interval but influential home scrum-half Robin Grice swung the game in RI's favour after taking a quick tap from a penalty and racing under the posts to draw the scores level and converted to edge them in front. Grice then fed Danny Wright on the charge to crash over the final score of the night.

York RI's first team have a club game against Otliensians at New Lane. Harrogate, already knocked out of the Powergen Cup, have no match but the Georgians are at Cleckheaton.

Updated: 10:56 Friday, October 15, 2004