Workington Town Ladies 20 v 0 Stanningley Ladies
Workington Town Ladies ended their 2025 Women’s RL League One home season with what was ultimately a comfortable win over Stanningley Ladies to cement third place in the table irrespective of the result of Town’s final away game of the regular season to fourth placed Fryston Warriors next weekend.
For the first 10 minutes of the game the sides looked evenly matched, with Stanningley using a strong front row to batter their way forwards, but good Town defence kept the visitors at bay.
Stanningley travelled with just 13 fit players and that front row began to look tired, and Town responded with props Beth Adams and Katelyn Mifsud putting in some big carries, and these coupled with some lightening fast breaks pushed the visitors backwards.
In turn Stanningley defended well, and neither side looked like scoring. On the quarter hour Town began to assert themselves, and excellent defence coupled and speed and quick passing going forwards gave Town the edge.
Having had a try disallowed for a forward pass, 20 minutes in a charge down the left wing and a superb offload from full back Lucy Mooney saw second-rower Meagan Byers touch down by the corner flag for an unconverted try. The deadlock was broken.
Town were now camped in the Stanningly half with Byers and scrum half Josie Scrimgour clear threats coming forwards, and stand-off Darcy Worth taking control of the game with some lovely distribution of the ball.
With five minutes left on the clock Scrimgour danced her way through a bemused Stanningly defence to touch down unchallenged under the sticks, giving Mooney a simple conversion and Town a 10-0 lead.
Four minutes later with the hooter about to sound, Worth set up Scrimgour on the right wing and the scrum half was too quick and too strong for the visitor’s defence and dived in to touch down leaving the score 14-0 at half time.
Town started the second half brightly and scored just five minutes in as interchange Georgia McConnan powered her way through under the sticks. A Mooney conversion took Town’s lead to an uncatchable 20-0.
That score proved to be the last of the match, the game lost momentum with repeated delays for injuries to Stanningley players, and ground to a close, although not before Scrimgour and Mifsud set up Georgia Naylor on the last tackle but Naylor was hauled down just a metre short of the Stanningley try line.
It was a good win for Town, with Darcy Worth named Town’s Woman of the Match, and Josie Scrimgour chosen as Cumbria Crack’s Gamestar.
Following Town Ladies’ final match next weekend, the play-offs will see Town and Fryston as the away sides joining home sides Widnes Vikings and Wakefield Trinity in the hunt for glory, with Town facing Wakefield.
After the match head coach Steve Caton said “As I sit here reflecting on our last home game of the season, I couldn’t be any more proud of this group of players, coaches and back room staff.
“Our aim at the start of the season was to be competitive in every game, and finish in a play off position, giving ourselves the opportunity of gaining back to back promotions. With one game left to play we have secured third position which means we will head to Wakefield in the semi-final of the play offs.”
