The weather took its toll on Saturday’s North Two West League games with only two games going ahead and Keswick were able to notch a 30-5 win at Southport.
The hosts had spent the morning spiking the pitch to drain surface water while waiting for the snow to melt. In the end, after the first 10 minutes, the match was played under blue skies, with a light breeze and no snow in sight.
It hadn’t looked promising en-route because going over Shap the Keswick coach travelled through a blizzard.
When it started it looked as though Keswick were lost in a snowstorm because they conceded after only two minutes.
Winning a line-out, the home side ran the ball through their backs, and their centre, coming in on an angled run, avoided the Keswick defence to score an unconverted try.
But just as the weather improved so did Keswick and those were the only points that Southport managed to score.
In these early stages, both sides looked to run with the ball but they each coughed up possession more easily than their coaches would have liked.
Keswick’s first chance of points came from a penalty kick on 10 minutes but from 40 metres out Billy Thompson’s effort bounced back off the upright and Southport cleared.
Keswick’s scrum dominance was clear and that led to a penalty 25 metres out on 14 minutes and this time Thompson converted.
Handling errors continued to cause problems but on 21 minutes there was no difficulty as a cross-field kick from Thompson was caught by Joe Bagnall on the right wing and he was able to beat the defender to score Keswick’s first try, converted by Thompson.
Most of the play was now in the Southport 22, where they stopped a rolling maul but were unlucky to knock forward from the back of their scrum. They then gave away a penalty which Thompson converted to extend the lead.
Both sides continued to play attacking rugby, but as well as meeting strong defences they continued to find handling a challenge, too often losing possession in the tackle.
A kick wide was picked up by Chris Potter who made good progress before the three front-rowers interchanged passes and crossed the line to touch down, but were brought back as the final pass was adjudged to have been forward.
Southport enjoyed some time in the Keswick 22 where a strong defensive effort kept them at bay, though their driving around the breakdown was very effective.
Having weathered the pressure Keswick got back into the Southport half where a penalty was converted by Thompson on 75 minutes.
Shortly after the restart, Southport lost possession on the Keswick ten-metre line and Karl Smyth hacked through for James Hinkley to pick up and run the last 22 metres to score to the right of the posts. Thompson converted.
As the clock ran down a turnover led to a great move on the right by Thompson and a good run in by Bagnall, who crossed the line but dropped the ball before he could touch it down,
There should have been another Keswick try when Bagnall fielded a crossfield kick and although tackled got the ball for Hinkley to cross but the pass was deemed forward.
But they were rewarded when Southport tried to run the ball from a defensive scrum but lost possession on their 22 where Chris Potter picked up and ran diagonally through the defence for Keswick’s third try, again converted by Thompson.
