By John Walsh

Last updated 12:14, Thursday, 20 November 2008

Mike Hawley of Workington has been scoring tries for fun this season with three hat-tricks already in his haul of 12 touchdowns.

Zebras’ Mike Hawley

He’s also a respected goal-kicker and on Saturday, in the 21-12 home win over Kirkby Lonsdale, he converted all three of his tries.

Not surprisingly the 22-year-old centre is the top try-scorer in the North Lancs Cumbria League – by some distance.

“It’s gone really well for me as far as try-scoring is concerned hut I don’t think it’s as tough a League as when I first played four years ago.

“Maybe it’s because I’ve got older and stronger but back then when I was a teenager I thought the teams were better,” he says.

Hawley, who hails from Whitehaven, was a soccer player until he was 16 but then began to concentrate on his rugby – because he was better at it.

“I’d always played rugby union from when I was at school but when I realised I was getting on quicker at rugby I put all my efforts into that,” he recalls.

He played originally for Egremont but switched to Workington on the invitation of former Zebras coach John Crichton, along with Sid Lowden, who had both been involved in his early rugby education.

Hawley had played for the various Cumbria age group sides from Under-13s through to Under-18s where he was selected for the North Under-18s when current Carlisle coach Richard Metcalf was in charge. He studied at Leeds University and either came back to west Cumbria to play for the Zebras or stayed down there to play for the University.

He’s now training to be a maths teacher and has his first placement at Stainburn School in Workington where he will be until January.

That’s a good place to be, too, as the Cumbria coach Malcolm Brown is a senior member of the PE Department.

“One of my ambitions is to play for the full Cumbria side. I was invited to the trials last year but couldn’t make them because of University

commitments. I’d like to think I might get an invite this time,” he says.

There might also be a debate about where to play the talented Hawley as he can operate at centre, stand-off or full-back.

His hat-tricks have come from centre this season but he played a lot of games at full-back and which, apparently, is his favoured position.

Workington team manager Kevin O’Neil is in no doubt about Hawley’s value to the side.

After his latest hat-trick at the Ellis, O’Neil said: “He’s just a class act and even though we were the better side we would have struggled to beat Kirkby Lonsdale without him.

“He scored two tries through individual flare and he has the ability to go past and round players quite comfortably.”

O’Neil, and the other Workington officials, will be hoping that the Zebras can mount a promotion charge this season because Hawley has ambitions.

“I want to play at the highest level possible and I would like to think that could be in Cumbria,” he says.