ONCE again heavy rain on Saturday morning saw already-saturated pitches fall victim to the weather as groundsmen lost the battle against the rising water levels.

With a complete washout looking likely, there was a proverbial ray of sunshine from Wilson Park where Haverigg reserves were scheduled to play Crooklands Casuals reserves.

Crooklands were looking for three points to keep their promotion hopes alive and Haverigg were in need of a win to kick-start their battle against relegation.

Both teams took the chance to field strong sides, and in conditions that can be best described as testing, the 22 players on the park produced some entertaining football in a cracking first half.

Crooklands started very fast and were 2-0 up inside the first 10 minutes. Crooklands’ pace right across their forward line was causing the Haverigg back four all sorts of problems and good finishing from Matt Pearson and Jake Stiendl gave Crooklands an early cushion.

Haverigg fought back, with Cullen and Foster testing the Crooklands keeper on a number of occasions. Another Haverigg attack looked to have been thwarted by a fantastic last-ditch tackle. But from the resulting corner, which Gav Scudamore delivered brilliantly, Josh Shaw glanced in to half the deficit.

Haverigg won another corner moments later and again Scudamore delivered a wicked ball which was deflected into his own net by a Crooklands defender to level the scores at 2-2. With the game heading to half-time seemingly all square, Crooklands once again created some space for their pacy forwards and Kieran Clark found the back of the net to put Cassies 3-2 in front.

When the teams took the field for the second half the wind had picked up considerably and the entertaining football of the first half was harder to execute.

The teams were finding chances harder to come by, although with Haverigg pushing for an equaliser Munroe hit the crossbar. This was the nearest either team came to scoring but the Haverigg defence was kept on their toes, with Crooklands looking dangerous every time they broke.

An entertaining game finished 3-2 to Crooklands. Haverigg gave their man of the match award to Ricky Jeynes, in a game well refereed by Derek Brown who showed why he is up there with the best officials in the league.

The only other local team to see any form of meaningful action was Walney Island who travelled to league favourites Leyland who are still unbeaten this season and notoriously difficult to play on their home turf.

Walney were 4-0 behind on the 70-minute mark and suddenly sprung into life when Kieran Sollaway broke clear to round the keeper. And moments later Sam Clayton latched onto a Josh Gay corner for the visitors who had Leyland on the back foot for the final 10 minutes of the game. But it was too little too late and Walney lost 4-2.

All the other fixtures were postponed and a few teams are now looking at the fixture lists which all point to another frantic end of the season. Fingers crossed for a dry week!