The scoreline would suggest a regulation home win as third from top hosted third from bottom of the league who were without a win. It wasn't that simple though as Penrith did their best to make life difficult for themselves and the visitors hung on in there, never gave up on what at times looked like a thankless task.
The weather conditions were far from ideal for good rugby and it took both sides a while to get used to the blustery wind, the wet and cooler conditions than of late. After ten minutes the Cumbrians opened their account and shortly after added a second try, they were both similar in nature coming from penalties being kicked to the corners for attacking lineouts.
The first was into the left hand corner and the home forwards successfully secured the throw to the lineout, they set up the driving maul; and made slow progress but Dan Richardson peeled off on the narrow side and forced his way over. The second was to the right corner and Josh Dowson took the ball and again the maul inched forward, this time Fraser Nicolson at scrum half saw the gap, took the responsibility and darted over from short range. Both conversions were well out and were missed but the home side led by ten points and looked to be on their way.
The next 20 minutes saw the home side appear to do everything in their power to keep Broughton Park in the game, they kicked badly, were guilty of spilling the ball too easily and would be lucky if they commanded 25% possession during this period. The game was played exclusively in the Penrith half and most of it in their 22 but to their credit they did defend very aggressively and the tackling was first rate and they kept their line intact.
The visitors did eventually score a try which was no surprise given the area the game was being played in and the amount of ball they had, again the score was wide out and the conversion awry. On the stroke of half time the home side conjured up a little bit of magic that had so far eluded them. Ryan Johnson won a turn over in midfield, the ball came quickly to Matty Boustead in the centre who had come off the bench to replace Arran Pamphilon who had suffered a nasty facial injury. He made an electric break easily beating the first line of defence and bore down on the fullback, Jamie McNaughton was up from fullback and alongside him, Boustead was able to get the ball to him and he cruised in under the posts. Penrith turned around at the break 17-5 up which looked a lot more reassuring than it might have.
The home side made rather easier work of the second period and ran in a further four tries, McNaughton scored the first after some good work by teenage winger Tom Knowles and the awareness of Jay Rossi to set him up to wrong foot the last defender and go in under the posts.
Steven Cherry was next on the scoresheet, the Penrith eight drove the visitors off their own scrum ball, Johnson made two storming runs in traffic up the middle of the field before the ball went wide and this time McNaughton turned provider to send Cherry in.
A mess at the base of a Penrith scrum in the middle of the pitch allowed the ball to be hacked into the Penrith half and this was the unlikely start of the next score, the ball was gathered by Boustead in acres of space. In this broken field scenario he is devastating and no one looked as if they were going to lay a hand on him but deep into the visitor's half he was finally caught up with, Rossi though was on hand to finish off the move and run in under the posts.
McNaughton completed his hat trick for the final Penrith try after a quickly taken penalty by Nicolson on half way, some quick hands from the home backs and some nifty footwork from the Penrith fullback saw him run in under the posts.
The visitors had never given up and continued to battle away for the full 80 minutes, they had scored one try during the second half and they completed the game by adding a third with the final play of the game.
The league now have a blank Saturday and in a fortnight Penrith will travel to Bowden looking for their second away win.