Long Trip to Barrow Leaves ‘Greens’ Down and Out

Following the euphoria of Wigton’s Cumbria Cup victory in April, the 1st XV set off for South Cumbria with high hopes of progressing to this year’s semi-finals. However, any thoughts of an easy success were quickly thwarted by a determined and resilient Furness team who overall deserved their 26-20 victory. Wigton were once again subject to player unavailability but nonetheless those players who did play including three 17 year olds in the squad gave their all but ultimately we were not clinical enough to get over the finishing line with victory in sight.

Furness kicked off in the sunshine with Wigton knocking on to give Furness an early advantage and a chance to put Wigton under pressure. A series of forward play eventually resulted in a try after 14 minutes, 5-0 to the hosts. A high tackle gave Furness a chance to extend their lead but fortunately the kick was missed. Wigton were beginning to settle into the game with some good probing kicks out of defence and from a rolling maul Wigton levelled with a Richard Jackson try, 5-5. The try seemed to galvanise Furness again and after a period of sustained pressure, Furness came away with a converted try to lead 12-5 on 28 minutes.
A good passage of running plays brought Wigton back into contention, and following a high tackle, Wigton were able to set up another rolling maul with Russell McLean touching down, the successful conversion by Jonny Charters brought the scores level 12-12 at the break.

An early penalty to Wigton straight after the start was converted by Jonny Charters and Wigton crept in front 12-15. Shortly afterwards Wigton were penalised for not rolling away, but once again the penalty kick was missed. Fergus Ledingham suffered a cut to his eye to match the one Richard Moffatt received during the warm up but after receiving treatment, Fergus returned to the fray.

Wigton were now gaining momentum but unfortunately after returning to the 1st team after missing 4 weeks with an ankle injury, Gregg Smith took another bad knock and had to be helped off the pitch to be replaced by Nick Benn. Despite this set back Wigton pressed into the Furness half with a good run by Richard Moffatt, he was tackled in the 22 but Wigton retrieved the ball and Jonny Charters scored a try in the corner giving Wigton a handy lead of 12-20, with victory for the taking.

However, the home team regrouped and with 10 minutes to go Furness passed the ball out wide to create a try and a simple conversion to bring the score back to 19-20. Two minutes later Furness took the lead with their 4th try, the successful conversion brought the score to 26-20. The Wigton players never gave up and continued to press throughout the final minutes of the game but with seconds to go Furness stole the ball and the game was over and Furness progressed into the semi-finals of the cup, much to the disappointment of the Wigton players and travelling supporters.

This was never going to be an easy game but Furness were the stronger team on the day and just about deserved to win. Wigton once again struggled with selection, but on the positive side Josh Nicholson gave a tremendous display in the pack and was only edged out for man of the match by Fergus Ledingham. Unfortunately, it looks like Gregg Smith will be out of action for a few weeks and both Richard Moffat and Fergus sustained nasty eye injuries.

Good luck to Furness in the semi-finals and Wigton will need to consolidate for the difficult trip to Vale of Lune on Saturday.