Barrow Island and Millom served up a good-old fashioned South Cumbrian derby in the latest round of matches in the Cumbria Conference.
It could have gone either way but it finished 24-22 to the Islanders with tries from Ellis Archer, Seth Woodend, man of the match Carl McBain and Fin Dutton.
Archer added four goals.
It was a really hard-fought first-half in which defences were on top and after the Island took the lead 6-0, Millom levelled-up before the break.
Although the home side regained the lead at 12-6 it was Millom who came back well, playing their best rugby of the game to go out into a 22-12 lead with just five minutes left.
But not for the first time they imploded again and the Islanders scored two tries, the second from the last play of the game to score under the posts and Archer’s fourth conversion secured the points.
Dom O’Brien scored a hat-trick of tries for Millom and Harley Thompson got over for the last, the only one which went unconverted.
The Islanders were delighted with what, at times, had been a backs to the wall effort and they gave a special mention to debutant Alex Brown.
Millom coach Brad Crellin gives his thoughts below on the game:
Also in the south of the county, Hensingham were too strong for Ulverston and came home with the points from a 62-6 victory.
It was 28-0 at half-time as Miller Dalton, Noel Branthwaite, Nate Frankland, Cohen Massey and Daniel McGarry scored tries, four converted by Dylan Bragg.
Dalton, Luke Clements and Bragg added to the lead, with two converted by Bragg before Ulverston got on the score sheet with a try by Isaac Tizzard converted by Alex Grimshaw.
Hensingham managed three more tries before the end as Preston Meloy, Dylan Cromwell and McGarry scored, all converted by man of the match Bragg.
Ulverston coach Mark Storey said: “We are doing it tough again as we had a lot of players missing but credit to the lads who played, they never gave in.
“Two of the youngsters Isaac Tizzard and Rob Pike are getting better every week.
“It would be really easy for us to just give up but I can’t fault the lads, they keep turning up each week and we will be better for it in the long run with lads gaining experience at this level.
“Hensingham are a class outfit on and off the field and they scored some well-worked tries.”
You can hear below what Hensingham coach Andrew Smith thought of the performance:
The only other game played was at Distington where the home side beat Maryport 43-26 after a very close first half.
It was virtually try for try with both sides responding every time the other scored and it was Distington who went into the break with a narrow 22-20 lead.
Anybody’s game at that stage and it was Maryport who struck first with a try from Ashley Smith, converted by Lewis Moore to put them 26-22 ahead.
But it was Distington who stepped-up a gear after that to pull away and they scored 21 further unanswered points.
The Distington scorers were Jack Penrice (2), Deaton Askew (2), Kelvin Lynch, Sean Sutton, Paddy Gaffney and Scott George. The other points were supplied by George with five conversion and a drop goal.
The Maryport tries in the first-half came from Danny Dryden, Keenan Winter, Charlie Bowman and their man of the match Moore who kicked two goals and played full-back instead of his usual scrum-half. Robbie Joe Worthington was the Distington man of the match.
You can hear the comments of Distington’s Ryan Hodgson below:
Maryport’s Mark Foster gives his views below:
There was one game in Division One of the Cumbria Men’s League in which Dalton A beat Egremont A 28-4, although it was called-off after around the 65th minute mark because of a serious injury to a Dalton player.
The Dalton tries came from Toby Conaghan, Pat Kelly, man of the match Ryan Baines, Niall Maudsley and Callum Leach. Elliot Wilkinson kicked three goals and Kelly put over one.
Craig Birkett scored the try for Egremont A.
