North Wales Crusaders took a top of the table clash with ease at Stadiwm CSM as they continued their run at the top of Betfred League One, sweeping aside second placed Workington Town.
Despite mid-week talk of a tight affair expected on the North Wales coast, Carl Forster’s Crusaders side got off to a flying start.
Having seen Jamie Dallimore run through with less than a minute played only for play to be pulled back for a knock-on in the build up, Crusaders opened the scoring with five minutes on the clock as Jordy Gibson made use of good field position following a penalty to crash over.
Just minutes later, Pat Ah Van then doubled the lead, finishing off a well worked move down the wing.
Having dominated the opening ten minutes, Crusaders became victims of their own success as Workington began to pressure the defensive line, making use of penalties and repeat sets to earn good field position.
Making use of this, the visitors hit back with two scores of their own first powering through from close range before causing problems with a high-kick on the last to level the scores at 10-10.
However, it took a matter of minutes for Crusaders to respond as Ah Van once again broke the Workington line, finding Ollie Brookes in support who made no mistake when crossing the whitewash.
Crusaders restored their 10 point lead just minutes later as Olly Davies opted to run on the last tackle catching the Town defence by surprise, creating room to score.
Workington started the second-half brightly, opening the scoring with 11 minutes played, once again making use of a last tackle kick to the corner.
Not allowing for a repeat of the first-half, Crusaders re-took a hold of the game, running in four tries in quick succession.
After Ant Walker powered his way over the defensive line, an Ah Van offload found Gibson who sent Sam Wilde through to score. The third score of the sequence came via Cole Oakley who danced through the defence before Gibson finished what was arguably the try of the afternoon having been found inside by Lloyd Roby who’d made an impressive break up field.
As the game entered it’s final ten minutes, both teams added to their points tally with a Workington try sandwiched between Crusaders efforts from Jamie Dallimore and Joe Baldwin respectively, completing a comprehensive 56-22 victory for Carl Forster’s side who shall return to action at Stadiwm CSM again this Sunday when they welcome play-off chasing Dewsbury.