Carlisle entertain Upper Eden tomorrow night in the first of the County Cup ties – essentially a quarter final game.
It will be a good guide for Carlisle as to what they can expect having been promoted from Counties 1 Cumbria as champions last season.
Upper Eden did exactly that 12 months ago and established themselves well in the League above, Regional 2 North.
Simon Barker will have charge of the Cup game which has a 7.30pm kick-off at Warwick Road.
Carlisle and Wigton had met at the weekend in a closely-fought contest which finished 46-43 in favour of the Warwick Road hosts.
Wigton took across a squad of 28, despite missing a number of regular starters due to other commitments.
The format decided on was to have three 30-minute segments with every player getting game time.
The three ‘games’ were evenly contested throughout, refereed by young Archie Harding, who communicated well to the players all game, leading to some free-flowing rugby enjoyed by a sizeable crowd.
Wigton won the first 30, then Carlisle dominated the second 30 before a draw in the final 30 minutes.
The Wigton forwards had a good afternoon and the work they have done on the set piece is bearing fruit which gave a much-changed back line plenty of attacking ball.
The handling and support play was excellent at times, producing some encouraging passages of play, leading to a number of tries where the whole team were involved.
Wigton’s try scorers were Matty Harrison, Brad Bouch, Elliot Armstrong, Joe Marrs, Cory Bouch, Oliver Jarrett and Charlie Bell with four being converted by Elliot Armstrong.
The downside was an injury to influential forward Jonny Dodd in the first tackle when he sustained an eye injury and had to leave the field.
Pacey winger Lee Elliot also suffered a knee injury. Both will be assessed and hopefully they will be available for the start of the league campaign next weekend.
Tomorrow night sees the culmination of pre-season when Wigton welcome Langholm to Lowmoor Road with kick off at 6.45pm (referee Alistair Jones). The teams met in March over the border and played-out an entertaining draw, so this should be a good challenge for the Wigton squad.
Kendal play on Saturday in their final warm-up game and they travel to take on Wharfedale.
There are several friendly fixtures on Sunday involving the ladies and youth – Carlisle Ladies v Annan (2pm, Martin Maughan); Upper Eden Ladies v Penrith Ladies (2pm, Martyn Harrison); Penrith Under-18s Ladies v Biggar (2pm, Martin Denvir); Carlisle Under-18s v Penrith Under-18s (11am, Mike Pate); Kendal Senior Colts v Keighley Under-18s (1pm, Stephen Elliott).
