YORK RUFC coach Lee Denham wants his team to make an immediate impact when the Yorkshire One leaders travel to Moortown tomorrow.

When the sides met at Clifton Park, a five-try first-half salvo sent York well on their way to a 32-15 win but since then, Denham has found his side rather invites the opposition on in the early stages.

Since their only defeat of the campaign, away at Middlesbrough, York have trailed early on in all three of their league games, most recently in last weekend’s 10-7 win at Selby.

Now Denham has called on his side to stamp their authority on the game from the off, citing York's crushing 81-5 RFU Intermediate Cup win at Gateshead as evidence they are capable.

He said: “We have been letting teams play against us, starting stronger and throwing what they’ve got at us, and we have been playing catch-up.

“We’ve been quite easy to read and not been doing anything out of the ordinary.

“We didn’t do it against Gateshead and hopefully we can get back to that, starting on Saturday.

“Moortown are a good side. We need to make our tackles and play our phases.”

Last week’s derby clash was also marked by a substantial number of infringements from the home side and although York had a much cleaner record in that regard, Denham has noted discipline as an area to improve on. Indeed, had Selby converted more of their penalty chances, they could have won the game.

He admitted: “We weren’t great last week but obviously Selby were a completely different side from the one we played at home as they’ve changed coach and quite a few players.

“We conceded six or seven penalties, which is too many. You can’t be giving five, six, seven kickable penalties away.”

Despite this coming fixture being York’s second away game in a row, Denham remains confident in his side’s abilities to get near securing the Yorkshire One crown before the end of the season.

He said: “What we don’t want is the league to take us into May when lots of players go off to play cricket or rugby league.

“We’ll go where the schedule takes us and just keep winning, take it one game at a time.”

The squad is likely to be similar to the previous few weeks. Outside centre Chris Peace is making good progress following a long-term knee injury and is nearing a return.

Selby face an important basement battle tomorrow when they travel to bottom side Wheatley Hills. Two-thirds of the hosts’ wins for the season have come in the last four games, although last week they lost 22-16 at Bradford Salem.

Pocklington remain bottom of North Premier after a 42-7 home loss to Lymm. Tomorrow they travel to second-placed Harrogate whose first loss in nine came last week at leaders Preston Grasshoppers.

A resurgent Malton & Norton have been edging towards North One East safety in the last few weeks, although they did drop a place to eighth following an 18-10 home loss to Driffield.

Malt’s scheduled visit to Bridlington has been rearranged for Saturday, April 28 as Brid are unable to raise a team.

York RI travel to Thirsk tomorrow. RI slipped to fourth in the Yorkshire Shield following 27-12 home defeat to Halifax while Thirsk lifted themselves off the bottom to fifth thanks to a 15-3 win at Hessle.