Wigton fail to recover from disastrous start

What a difference 7 days make as Wigton travelled down the M6 to play Tyldesley following their 35-0 home victory last weekend against the same team. On this occasion Wigton were without the services of 6 players and Tyldesley’s team was strengthened with a number of returning players.

Wigton collected the ball from Tyldesley’s kick off but somehow lost possession and the attacking Tyldesley player broke through the tackle and over the line for a converted try, 7-0 in the first minute. Things got worse as Tyldesley crossed the line again after only 7 minutes to lead 14-0.

Wigton regained their composure and started to get back into the game and a strong rolling maul took Wigton into the opposing 22, the maul was brought down but from the resultant scrum, Wigton knocked on. From a similar phase of play Wigton had an overlap on the outside but the ball was fumbled and a glaring opportunity was lost.

Despite Wigton’s increase in possession they fell further behind to a Tyldesley penalty on 21 minutes and the lead was extended to 17-0. Just before half time, Wigton finally crossed the line with an Owen Bonney try on 40 minutes converted by Dan Reed and the half time score was 17-7.

The second half saw Wigton having much more possession and the rolling mauls were causing Tyldesley lots of problems but the wet conditions and slippery ball resulted in a lot of dropped balls and several chances went begging. Richard Jackson was shown the yellow card for an infringement in front of the posts and Tyldesley kicked a straightforward penalty to lead 20-7.

In spite of Wigton dominating possession in the second half, the strong Tyldesley defence was difficult to break down and Wigton were unable to score any more points and Tyldesley won 20-7.