Playing up the slope in the first half Rossendale exerted early pressure going through a number of phases before full back Dennison won the chase to his own deft kick

Ahead to score wide out. Although the conversion was missed Sharratt made amends with a well struck penalty to give Dale a half time lead 8 points to nil.

Playing downhill in the second half and towards a vociferous wagon expectations were high for further Rossendale tries but a mixture of sloppy handling errors

And some stout Penrith defence denied Rossendale any further points apart from another Will Sharratt penalty.

Rossendale’s cause was not assisted by a number of inexplicable refereeing decisions resulting in a large number of kickable penalties to Penrith and the eventual

Sin binning of Rossendale’s Danny Collins and Judd Bamford who had only arrived from the subs bench five minutes earlier!

Fortunately for Dale, the Penrith number ten had not brought his kicking boots landing only one from seven attempts.

Despite securing a valuable home win, there was a general feeling in the Rossendale camp that missed opportunities had cost Dale a try bonus point.

On the positive side Rossendale now lie third in National League Three North knowing full well that they are not firing on all cylinders and that there is definitely more to come. Hopefully this can be achieved on Saturday when they travel to play Leeds based Morley kick off 3pm