Carlisle Rugby Club and Penrith have the chance to take stock this weekend, clear of any fixtures in North One West.

League leaders Carlisle will be hoping that a number of injuries clear up before their next game on March 2 when they host Blackburn, their nearest rivals, 11 points behind.

For Penrith, just three points clear of the drop zone, they need to be clear-headed and focused on their next game – home to Anselmians, doomed already to the drop.

Carlisle know that any sort of victory will be good enough to take them a step nearer the league title.

Blackburn, who are on a bit of a roll, need a big win with Carlisle taking nothing from the game.

Most worrying for Carlisle is the run of injuries that they have picked up, with four current players going through concussion protocols that is testing the squad depth to its limits.

One of those, skipper Chris Auld, lasted only four minutes on Saturday before he had to be taken off with a head injury.

In a remarkable game, Carlisle staged a terrific second-half recovery to beat Burnage 36-33 after they had trailed 26-7 at the half-time interval.

All they had to show for their efforts was a penalty try while relegation candidates Burnage had claimed their bonus-point try before the interval.

Whatever was said at half-time by coach Matt Shields, he should remember it well because Carlisle were a different side after the change round.

It was looking like an honourable draw at 33-33 when Carlisle were awarded a last-gasp penalty and Jason Israel was on target to give the Cumbrians a quite remarkable victory.

Four second-half tries from man-of-the-match John Short, Henry Wainwright, James Telford and Josh Holmes had put Carlisle level before the boot of Israel won it.

Penrith’s away form has been pretty abysmal all season, yet they did well enough at Broughton Park for long periods until fading in the final quarter to lose 25-17.

After a poor start, they had got themselves back into the game and, going into the final quarter were even leading, then just fell away at the end.

Trailing 15-7 at half-time, after being second best for long periods in the first half, it wasn’t a bad return.

George Graham had scored the try, converted by Nathan Wooff, and in the third quarter of the game, they went ahead through a try from Mike Hawley with a Wooff conversion and penalty.

But in the last 15 minutes, Broughton Park came through to win with a converted try and a penalty.

No doubt about it, Penrith need maximum points against Anselmians on March 2 to boost their safety chances.

In the Cumbria League, it’s looking like Keswick are going to clinch the title as they have won their two opening games to open up a 15-point lead.

Two of their last four games are against Aspatria, the side nearest to them so probably need only to win one of them to clinch promotion.

On Saturday, they beat Cockermouth 24-7 with tries from Andy Muir, Ryan Weir, Michael Tait and Aaran Thompson.

Aspatria lost ground but stay comfortably second after a thrilling 27-26 defeat at Wigton.

The Greens are determined to put in a positive show over the second phase of the season and this was a very good effort, although they won in dramatic fashion.

Deep into stoppage-time, James Wilson crashed over for the winning try after Lewis Placket had helped himself to a second-half hat-trick of tries. For Aspatria, there were tries for Kenneth Bowes (2), Phil Dixon and Andrew Miller.

Cumbria League One A and One B take a break this weekend, although there are three games planed in Cumbria Two, Moresby v Windermere, Silloth v Millom, Egremont v Carlisle Crusaders.