Barrow Raiders remain in trouble next to bottom of the Betfred Championship after they lost 36-18 at Sheffield.
It was doubly disappointing as their opponents had Vila Halafihi sent-off after just 27 for a high tackle as they couldn’t make it pay.
It hadn’t started well as Sheffield scored after only two minutes when Joel Farrell somehow got through a cluster of Barrow defenders to make the first touchdown.
Gradually, though, Barrow worked their way back into the game and on 17 minutes they were level.
Shane Toal shrugged off some tackles to storm away out of defence and he was able to off-load to Ryan Johnston, who darted through the Eagles’ defence to level the scores with an unconverted try.
But they hadn’t parity for long and four minutes later Matty Dawson Jones went over in the corner.
Charlie Emslie was laid out after 27 minutes by a high tackle from Vila Halafihi, who paid the price with a red card. From the penalty Ryan Shaw cut the deficit to two points with a successful kick.
It stayed 8-6 until half-time but with a man advantage and only two points in arrears Barrow fully expected to turn things around in the second half.
But it didn’t turn out like that and two minutes after the change-round Anthony Thackeray intercepted and raced almost the full length of the pitch to score.
On 48 minutes Barrow were hit again when Jesse Sene Lefao dived between two Barrow defenders to score the fourth Sheffield try, but the first to be converted as Cory Aston added the extras.
Barrow had been unable to make their man advantage tell and it was 12 against 12 for ten minutes when Luke Broadbent was sent to the sin bin on 62 minutes.
Five minutes later Sheffield were in again as the ball was lifted high on the last tackle and Lefao collected to go over the line. Aston converted.
Broadbent was still in the bin when Sheffield scored again as Ross Oakes pounced on a low kick through. Aston’s conversion just about wrapped-up the points. Aston’s conversion was the last act of the game.
When Broadbent returned to the field the Raiders scored. Josh Wood fed Greg Burke and he crashed over the line for Shaw to convert.
Paul Crarey’s men scored again a minute from the end when the ball was offloaded to Luke Cresswell who scooted in from five yards.
But there was still time for another Sheffield score. The Eagles threw the ball out wide on the halfway line and shot down the wing before Thackeray gives support on the inside and takes the pass and touchdown as the hooter sounds.
