Last updated 01:00, Monday, 10 September 2007

Swinton Lions 36 Workington Town 26

A MAD seven-minute spell in the first half, that saw a total of four players sent to the sin-bin put paid to Workington’s hopes of ending the regular season with a victory.

Three Town players and one from the hosts were given yellow cards as the referee lost control of a bad tempered match and in the time Les Ashe and Craig Barker’s side were down to ten men, the hosts ran in three tries to give Town a second half mountain to climb.

A brave 12-man fightback gave the score a more respectable slant, doing justice to a solid Workington performance that would probably have yielded maximum points were it not for the card brandishing of man-in-the-middle Jamie Leahy.

The game was effectively a dead rubber for injury-hit Town, who started without last week’s three-try hero Shaun Lunt, however they didn’t look like a team with nothing to play for as they took the match to the Lions in the opening exchanges.

It wasn’t until the eighth minute however that the deadlock was broken. Carl Forber’s forty-twenty gave Town a scrum deep into Swinton territory and Franco Kmet broke from the pack to receive the ball and go over down the right flank, though Forber’s kick came back off the post.

Four minutes later, it was the hosts that were ahead, a lead they would never relinquish. Dexter Miller was penalised for a high tackle and at the end of the resultant set of six, Andy Saywell latched on to a kick through to touch down in the right corner, a try that was converted by Lee Marsh.

Then on the 20-minute mark, Carl Forber and Lions scrum-half Jay Duffy went toe-to-toe and were sent to the sin bin with Miller following shortly after having lashed out in the tackle whilst in possession.

Two high tackles were then not punished by cards, much to the chagrin of the Town bench, and as the teams squared up again, referee Leahy called in the captains to try and restore order.

It didn’t seem to work however as Taani Lavulavu was almost immediately given an enforced ten-minute breather for a high shot.

It was at this point that the game slipped away from Town as Swinton made full use of their numerical advantage and the inevitable gaps, by running in three tries courtesy of a brace from the impressive Martin Moana and a bundled effort from winger Marlon Billy; Marsh adding the extras to two of the three to give Swinton a 22-4 half-time lead.

To their credit, Town were again quickly out of the blocks after the interval, Carl Forber’s cross field kick was pounced upon by the excellent Jason Mossop and Forber goaled to reduce the deficit to 12 points. Seven minutes later though and Workington’s comeback was stopped in it’s tracks as Taani Lavulavu was controversially sent off for an incident in the tackle and within 15 minutes Town were 34-10 behind. Swinton again used the extra man, creating tries from Saywell and Billy, both converted by Marsh.

Twelve man Town refused to buckle though; a lovely reverse pass by Martin Keavney allowed Martyn Wilson to cross, Adam Sidlow, following a Marsh penalty for the hosts, expertly occupied five Swinton tacklers before offloading for Wilson to score again before Forber’s neat kick through was touched down by Ryan Blair in the corner.

Forber was successful with two of the kicks and Workington had grabbed a well-deserved bonus point; the very least their efforts deserved on the day.