Sunday 11^th November 2001
Women’s Premier Division
BARROW LADIES  50 KEIGHLEY ALBION CATS  36

A severely depleted Albion Cats almost pulled off a quite improbable victory in a highly entertaining game up in Cumbria last Sunday. Injuries and work commitments had robbed the Cats of half a dozen first choice players and they finally travelled with only 12. A prolonged journey also meant that they arrived in Barrow with only 2 minutes to spare prior to kick off.

The game got under way with Keighley still mentally on the bus and after only 10 minutes they found themselves 18 nil down. Playing with the advantage of a pronounced slope Sally Milburn, Barrow’s Great Britain loose forward was creating havoc in the Keighley defence each time she got the ball and in the opening minutes she twice scored herself and put the winger in for another score. All three scores were converted and the game looked over as a contest.

However the Cats stopped the rot and began to settle down, Sharon Wilmot was making good yardage from prop and Sarah Gatenby was also getting through at lot of work. From a good move up the slope Keira Burns burst through the defence and scored a fine try under the sticks. Laura Ackroyd adding the conversion.

It was now end to end stuff and Barrow came back to score two more unconverted tries. However back came the Cats and a wonderful pass from Tracy Lynch put Ackroyd in by the sticks and she also added on the conversion. Right on half time Milburn scored again for Barrow to extend their lead to 30 points to 12 at half time.

Straight from the restart Milburn scored again and the game once again looked over as a contest. However the next half hour was all Keighley as Ackroyd scored a further two tries to complete a fine hat trick, both of which she also converted to bring the score to 34 – 24 in Barrows favour. Then against the run of play Barrow broke away to score a converted try to make the score 40 points to 24 with less than 10 minutes to go.

The Keighley side were still not done, Ackroyd scored another try which she then converted, Burns followed  her own up and under to score a second try and Ackroyd converted again. It was now 40 points to 36 and Barrow were hanging on by their fingernails.

The Cats swept downfield again and with the clock running down you felt that they would win the game. Unfortunately the ball went loose when trying to keep it alive and the Barrow winger hared up the field to score under the posts. The kick was converted to clinch victory for the Cumbrians and right at the death with the match lost a cheeky piece of play from the Barrow stand-off led to her scoring the final try.

With the conversion the referee brought to an end a thoroughly entertaining game, which Keighley would have won had they not been travel weary at the kick off. However the performance was a credit to the 12 players and the team are keenly anticipating the Barrow teams visit to Keighley.

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