JON Dawes’ injury-time penalty secured the Yorkshire One title for York in dramatic fashion after earning a 25-25 home draw with Heath.

The Clifton Park outfit will now take their place in North One (East) next season, having picked up two points for a draw and one for scoring four tries thanks to the efforts of Toby Atkin (2), Rob Hodges and Shane Goulding.

Dawes had failed to kick any of his first three attempts at a conversion, but did the honours following Atkin’s final try and went on to hold his nerve when it mattered most.

York selected a strong 18 for the contest with Darren Rutherford, Simon Webster and Steve Johnson making up the front row, but play-off chasing Heath started well, with two consecutive penalties advancing them into a scoring position.

Full-back Sam Pollard went on to find space in the back line and linked with winger Simon Brown to score.

Ezra Hinchcliffe missed the extras, but was successful with the second of two penalties awarded for back-chat and offside.

Heath prop Oliver Cook went on to make heavy contact with York inside-centre Sam Potrykus and captain Sam Forbes was shown a yellow card for protesting that there were no arms wrapped around in the tackle.

Joe Maud also saw yellow for dissent and Hinchcliffe kicked the resulting penalty to give the visitors an 11-0 lead against 13-man York.

Winger Hodges, scored a solo try, though, when he chipped over the defence, re-gathered and touched down.

Under heavy Heath pressure, York were showing resolve and, on one occasion, Rutherford gained very important ground, enabling fly-half Liam Hessay to make an excellent clearing kick.

But, even after the two sin-binned players returned, Heath continued to press, threatening with a rolling maul, only for prominent defensive trio Chris Fox, Webster and Johnson to reverse possession, while Hessay cleared very well again to gain 40 metres.

As territory became more even, an initial break in midfield by Dawes and a tight carry by Rutherford saw Johnson feed Goulding to crash over.

Jason Merrie hit back for the away team, however, when York had to scramble in defence after a line break.

Heath were initially stopped a metre out, but the ball was recycled and Merrie got the try, which was converted to leave the Halifax team leading by eight points at the interval.

York restarted the game powerfully, going through five phases and gaining 50 metres, before Merrie secured a turnover.

After using their interchanges, with Chris Peace swapping with Potrykus in the centres and Josh Parker switching with Lewis Hannibal in the back row, Goulding showed good acceleration and agility to bust through the Heath midfield and put York in an attacking position.

The Heath defence scrambled well, but Peace was tackled high, only for the penalty to finish wide.

Maud then twice went very close to the Heath line before Atkin stretched and scored from the base of a ruck.

Moments later, Peace was yellow carded for a high tackle, with forward Martin Barnes scoring for Heath under an extended attacking advantage.

The conversion was good, leaving the West Yorkshire team ten points ahead with 15 minutes remaining.

But Heath picked up two yellow cards with Simon Brown punished for a high tackle and Richard Brown also sent to the sin-bin and York capitalised with Atkin, after getting over the line but being adjudged as held up, grabbing an uncontrolled ball at the base of a defensive Heath scrum to score.

Dawes went on to convert before sealing the all-important draw at the death.