LOAN man James Duerden has made a permanent switch to Barrow Raiders.

The second-rower joined Barrow from Workington for the latter stages of the League One campaign, making six appearances in the ultimately unsuccessful push for the play-offs.

Duerden’s contract at Derwent Park expired at the end of the season and the former Dalton and Askam amateur has opted to join old coach Paul Crarey at Craven Park.

“James is a friend of mine,” said Crarey. “He played for me while I was at Dalton and for BARLA.

“It was really tough for him at Workington, going into a Championship club from the amateur game, but when he got his shot, he did really well.

“We asked if we could take him on loan and Mark (Fryer, the Workington vice-chairman) and Phil Veivers (the Workington coach) said that we could.

“He might have found it hard coming into a new set of systems halfway through the season, but he did really well.

“As he got going with us, he really improved and at York (in Barrow’s win on the final day of the season) he was a machine – they were sick of the sight of him by the end of the match. He was Mr Perpetual Motion.”

Duerden has signed a two-year contract at Craven Park and, having just turned 24, still has a long career in front of him.

With club skipper Liam Harrison approaching the end of his career, the extended terms of his deal should prove beneficial to Raiders.

Joint-director of rugby Andy Gaffney was certainly pleased to have secured his services for the medium-term, and said: “I’m a big fan of James Duerden. He has been fantastic since he has come to us from Workington.

“He’s a strong, young player with good skills and under Cresta I’m sure he will keep coming on in leaps and bounds.

“He’s not only strong going forward, but he’s got a good offload and, for a big forward, he’s very skilful.”

For Crarey, the permanent deal for former BARLA Great Britain amateur international Duerden fits in with his overall desire to secure the best local talent.

“He wanted to come in with us and it was the end of his contract with Workington,” the coach added.

“He’s a local kid as well and we won’t have many travellers this year. Even the away lads, Joe Bullock, Anthony Bate and Josh Ward are moving up tothe area.

“We’re building something for the future.”

The announcement of Duerden’s signing follows hot on the heels of those of Joe Hambley and Chris Fleming earlier this week.

The young trio join a steadily growing list of players committed to the Craven Park cause next year, with Bullock, Ward, Bate, Oliver Wilkes, Ryan Fieldhouse, Lee Haney, Brad Marwood, Liam Campbell, Nathan Mossop, Andrew Dawson, Dan Toal, Shane Toal, Adam Nicholson and Andy Litherland also on board.

More deals are expected to be announced in the coming days.