BARROW Raiders head coach Paul Crarey was thrilled his team had come through a tough encounter and picked up two points in a 20-10 win against London Skolars, but blamed referee Geoffrey Poumes for a stilted performance.

“It was never going to be a sparkler, it never is for us here, it’s always a war and I think the match official contributed to that,” he said afterwards.

“There were short 10s, infringements and last tackle penalties so the game never got going.

“Nobody can play off slow rucks so it was about marching down the other end and diving over the line, and we did that a couple of times.

“They got a couple of soft tries but we managed the game and were pretty comfortable at the end.

“We defended really well but as a spectacle it was poor for the fans.”

As for Poumes’ display, he said: “I spoke to the match commissioner and we were disappointed how it was officiated.

“He (Poumers) dropped the game short in the first half, nobody knew what had happened, players started walking off and the time keeper had not blown the hooter. I’ve never seen that before in professional rugby league.

“We seemed to then add it on at the end of game, we had it at 46 minutes for the second half, which is a lot of time to be added to the game but it was not stopped through injuries, it was penalties, penalties, penalties and you could not take quick taps.

“Everyone had to be set all the time and it was a slugfest for both sides.

“There was no width and you could not play any real shape.

“Our pivots got cut off so we started turning the ball back inside and pushing hard through the middle and that was good enough to win the game.”

He added, “It’s a difficult place to come, Whitehaven scrapped for a win and we had to scrap for a win but that’s what you have to do unless you want to blow them away by pushing through the middle hard.

“It’s going to be interesting in the next few weeks how teams handle the pressure being at the top end of the table. It’s a different type of pressure from fighting for the eights, we are desperate to stay where we are but you have to win games.”

This was a brutal encounter at times and Barrow finished the match with a number of injured players to add to a growing injury list that already included Joe Bullock and Luke Cresswell.

“We lost Lewis Charnock with a head injury, Declan Hulme with an elbow that looks long term and Oliver Wilkes with a dead leg,” said Crarey.

“We sat with one sub for an eternity but didn’t look fazed by what they were throwing at us and got the win.

“Our injury list is mounting but we are still winning and that puts the pressure on everybody above us to keep winning.”