Hawcoat Park 31 Littleborough 19

A PATCHED-up Hawcoat Park side eased their fears of relegation from the North Lancs/Cumbria League with victory at home to fellow strugglers Littleborough.

Despite several late changes to the line-up, Hawcoat could hardly have made a better start, scoring a try in the opening five minutes on the back of a strong carry from Ashley Mowat.

The second row laid the platform for Jonny Burrows to move the ball through hands, with Chris Burns sending Scott Garnett, playing out of position on the wing, over out wide for an unconverted score.

A second try followed for the Maroon and Whites five minutes later, this time the returning Ryan Milner and Adam Grainger putting them on the front foot before the ball was moved to Grady Slater, who ran hard to force his way over.

The kicking from Hawcoat fly-half James Howden and full-back George Smith kept the pressure on Littleborough, while John Donnan and Slater went close to scoring again, only to be denied by some good defence from the visitors.

Littleborough started to make inroads with some hard running of their own, and the pressure told midway through the half when their fly-half forced his way over for a converted try.

Smith kicked a penalty to edge Hawcoat further ahead, but he was then sent to the sin-bin for a high tackle.

It was during this period Littleborough managed to get their second try – this time unconverted – with the centre forcing his way over to make it 13-12 to the hosts at half-time.

The visitors dominated the first 15 minutes after the restart, only to be thwarted by the defence each time, and when Hawcoat managed to exert some pressure they secured their third try as Josh Vial forced his way over following a strong driving maul.

A penalty try from a scrum ensured the bonus point for Hawcoat as well, and Smith pushed them further in front by kicking two penalties as the away side started to find themselves on the wrong side of the referee.

This was compounded when their captain was shown a red card for speaking out of turn to the match official, but it was Littleborough who finished the game strongly and forced their way over for a converted try on the stroke of full-time.

The two sides will do it again this Saturday at Littleborough's home ground near Rochdale, with that match having been rearranged from earlier in the season.