SEDGLEY coach Geoff Roberts believes gaining promotion from National League Division Two North will be tougher than ever this season.

The Tigers crashed to their first defeat of the campaign at home to leaders Ampthill & District on Saturday, slipping to fifth place in the league, six points behind the Bedfordshire men.

“The results in the league have been strange so far this season,” said Roberts.

“Ampthill put 66 points on Leicester Lions last week and this week the Lions have tonked Stourbridge, who are one of the favourites. It just doesn’t stack up.

“Ampthill have to crack somewhere and I do think they will. It’s whether they can handle some teams who really move the ball around.

“Maybe with Stourbridge cracking and us being beaten the league will be a little more open at the top of the table this year than it was last season.

“We have Leicester next week so it will be interesting to see how we do against them.”

The Tigers had made the perfect start with two tries and a conversion in the opening five minutes but ill-discipline allowed the visitors to gain the upper hand midway through the first half and from then the Tigers struggled.

“They looked shell-shocked in the opening 20 minutes. We were all over them,” said Roberts.

“We also had a kicking chance to make it 15-0 but unfortunately the kick was missed.

“They didn’t know how to cope with us but over the course of the game we lost that initiative.”

The turning point came when Callum McShane, who scored two early tries for the Tigers, had to leave the field to have stitches in a cut eye and his replacement, Stephen Collins, was quickly sin-binned.

Roberts added: “Ill-discipline is something you can’t afford when you are playing in the big games. In that period when we were down to 14 men Ampthill came back at us and we never really recovered.”

McShane’s double and a Matt Riley conversion in the opening five minutes put the Tigers 12-0 up. But the visitors fought back to within two points at the break with a try from Jonathan Raven and a conversion and penalty from Joseph Tarrant.

Ampthill’s Kieran Duffin and Michael Di Ponio went over for converted tries in the second half.

Collins countered with a penalty and Tigers captain Juan Crous went over for an unconverted try to reduce the defecit to 24-20.

But Tarrant added his second penalty of the afternoon and Daryl Dyer grounded a 66th minute try to seal the win for the visitors.

Seventh-placed Leicester Lions visit the Tigers on Saturday, kick off 2.30pm.