Walney Central 8 Thatto Heath 12

HEATH'S young guns came of age to put Crusaders into the second round draw of the Powergen Challenge Cup in atrocious weather conditions.

Fielding no fewer than seven teenagers, matters looked bleak for Heath against a huge home side, particularly when they were two points down after only three minutes following a penalty for holding down which gave stand-off Herbert a go at goal.

Fullback Mike Woods was given the chance to level the scores on nine minutes but his attempt just went wide.

There were many handling errors in the first half, mainly by Crusaders, due to the strong wind and rain. This put Heath on the back foot for most of the first half but their defence, led by GB hooker Darren Mitchell (playing at scrum half) and ex-pro Tommy Hodgkinson at loose forward, was more than up to the task.

Three minutes before half time, with Heath on a rare attack, the ball was shifted left finding Mitchell out wide. Mitchell broke through the defence then stepped inside the cover to dive over in the corner from 25 yards out. Woods missed the difficult conversion leaving the half time score 2-4.

Four minutes into the second stanza, a fine cross-field passing movement ended with a long ball from stand-off Anthony Marsh to centre Mark Hayton who burst through the gap.

Hayton then put a clever kick through for Woods but he was agonisingly short of a touchdown as the ball rolled just dead.

From the 22 metre tap restart, the Cents went downfield via a series of penalties, the final one of which gave Herbert the chance for another two points but his attempt missed.

On 53 minutes, a kick through by Hayton bounced kindly into the path of left wingman Mark Webster who dribbled the ball around a defender before picking up and putting Hayton in at the corner.

Again Woods failed to make the conversion into the strong wind.

Heath where playing much better rugby in this half with Marsh pinning back the Cumbrians with some astute kicking.

Second row Johnny Hughes was making great yards along with substitute utility forward Dave Gee.

This good work was rewarded following a barn storming run by prop Alan Dootson who fed Marsh who in turn unleashed Woods 20 yards out, skirting around the cover to dive over on the left.

A poor clearance kick by Heath, with 13 minutes remaining, saw the ball going out on the full giving Cents a good attacking field position.

Stand-off Herbert, danced through Heath's defence to score right of the posts and the conversion from McKinley set up a dramatic final 10 minutes with the score at 8-12.

Walney piled on the pressure and centre Dave Hull, who had switched to full-back, kept his nerve under a couple of tricky high balls in the strong cross-field wind.

Next week Heath travel to Castleford Lock Lane in the Arriva Trains Conference Premier with the coach leaving the Springfield at 11am.