Egremont kicked off the new year in fine style, winning a highly entertaining and high-scoring Cumbria League match with Carlisle Crusaders 52-27.

Egremont coach Marc Long was full of praise for his side, particularly as he had to call upon coaches Warren Stainton at fly-half and Jude Barton in the back row to help out on the playing front due to injuries and illness among the squad.

There were also welcome returns to action from number eight Liam Martin and prop Garry Dougan, both of whom contributed greatly to the success of the overall performance.

The home team made much the brighter start and, with centre Callum Huck and full-back Brad Jackson both in particularly strong form, the scores were not long in coming.

Wing Matt Huck scored the first try of what was to be an outstanding personal hat-trick for him, with centres Cameron Moore and Callum Huck both adding touchdowns.

Carlisle recovered to score two unconverted tries themselves, before Matt Huck got his second to close the half.

With Brad Jackson on fine form with the boot, Egremont looked good with a 24-10 lead at the break.

If the first half had been good, the second period did not disappoint either.

The home crowd was treated to a cut and thrust performance from both teams with Egremont adding a further four converted tries from flanker Josh Graves, scrum-half Kieran Halcrow, a second for Moore and the hat-trick clincher from Huck.

Egremont most certainly did not get their own way however, as Carlisle gained confidence in a free-running performance which gathered them three further tries of their own.

Both teams thoroughly deserved their bonus points for scoring eight and five tries respectively.

Carlisle are due to return to Bleach Green this Saturday for a Cumbria League Cup match.

For the second week running, Cockermouth got off to a slow and frustrating start but finished the game in style, beating St. Benedict’s Ravens 57-3.

The first half was very stop-start with both teams making a lot of core skill mistakes and the referee blowing the whistle on many occasions for the new tackle law, much to the frustration of players and spectators.

One such tackle, which seemed to be of no concern, resulted in flanker Matt Thompson being sin binned.

This new law is meant to open-up the game to a more attacking mode of rugby but is taking some time to adapt to.

St Benedict’s, realising the Cockermouth home defence was strong, opted to kick their first attacking points and took an early 3-0 lead.

Cockermouth responded well with Peter Wood getting on the end of a good offload to score the opening try.

Although the Wasps always looked dangerous with the ball and in structure, bad habits kept at the forefront of the game with lots of mistakes occurring and no momentum being gained.

In the periods when the ball was kept in possession, further tries were added by Charles Van Den Bossche, converted by Matt Henson and a second for Wood, so that the home side led 17-3 at the break.

The second half got off to a thunderous start for the Wasps and fortunately they were able to maintain this for a period of 25 minutes.

From the restart kick, Paul Greening attacked the ball at pace and out jumped the St Benedict's second row.

The next three phases were played with direction and skill and opened up space for Van Den Bossche to score.

Over this next period, excellent rugby was played with forwards setting an excellent platform through drives from captain James Hunter, Sam Wilson and Adam Brough and outside centre, Wood being given great space at the edge to further his scoring tally and create space for his wingers.

Tries were scored by Sam Wilson, McKenzie Jenkin, Mark Watson, Andrew Branthwaite and Wood (2) with conversions by Watson.

In the main game, Keswick edged out Whitehaven 14-13 at Davidson Park to maintain their unbeaten record.