Barrow Raiders are still too close to the drop zone for comfort after losing 38-12 at Halifax.
It enabled the Panthers to pull three points clear of the south Cumbrians who are a point better off than Swinton and Whitehaven with the doomed Dewsbury below them,
It’s still all to play for down there, trying to avoid automatic relegation while also avoiding the relegation/promotion play-off game.
Barrow had a good go at it but weren’t helped by having to play for ten minutes with 11 men as Brett Carter was sin-binned and Delaine Bedward-Gittens were red-carded around the same time.
It was only 18-12 at the time and it was to Barrow’s credit that the Panthers only added a penalty while they were under a two-man handicap but the effort told a tale at the end when they played-out the rest of the game with 12.
Halifax had gone in front on nine minute with an unconverted try by Ben Tibbs and by the 24th minute that had grown to 14-0 with two more tries.
James Saltonstall and James Woodburn-Hall both got in for tries with one converted by Louis Jouffret.
Barrow fought back well and by half-time had reduced the deficit with tries from Shane Toal and Luke Cresswell, both converted by Brad Walker.
So it was anybody’s game at that stage, but the at the start of the second-half Tibbs went in for his second try and Barrow had their men shown red and yellow cards to give the game a different complexion.
That penalty while Raiders were down to 11 made it 20-12 and then Barrow had a good spell in which both Andrew Bulman and Brad Walker were close to scoring.
But the Panthers weathered the storm and on 62 minutes when Shane Toal off-loaded 30 metres from the Halifax line it was straight into the hands of Joe Keyes who raced away to score. Jouffret converted.
There was no way back now for the depleted Raiders and five minutes from the end a high ball caused mayhem in their defence, resulting in Ben Kavanagh touching down and Jouffret converted.
A minute from the end Charlie Graham scored the final try, converted by Jouffret.
