Wolves send Vikings down

Wolves send Vikings down

Widnes were relegated from the engage Super League as they crashed to a 60-16 defeat at the hands of rivals Warrington.

The rampant Wolves ran in 11 tries at the Halton Stadium as they hammered the final nail in Widnes? campaign and ended their four-year stay in the top flight.

Ten different players got on the scoresheet for the Wolves ? with Henry Fa?afili and Toa Kohe getting two tries each and Chris Bridge eight goals ? to revive their hopes of claiming third spot after three successive defeats.

The fight drained from Widnes in the second half as Warrington added 34 points to their score with ease.

Their survival chances ? which would still have been slim if they had won ? looked over when Warrington raced into a second-minute lead.

Lee Briers, sorely missed through injury in Warrington?s last two games, immediately announced his return with a break that sent Fa?afili clear on the right.

The ball was worked back inside but Briers returned the ball wide with a high kick to the corner and Fa?afili crashed over.

A similar kick almost yielded a second Fa?afili try soon after but to their credit Widnes fought back and levelled the scores when Keiran Kerr sent Adam Hughes over for four points.

The Vikings actually enjoyed a good spell of pressure with Kerr at the fore but the visitors held firm and reclaimed the lead when Nathan Wood put Ben Westwood through a gap.

Warrington turned up the pressure and claimed a third try after another Briers break. Widnes were unlucky when Hughes beat Wood to Briers? dangerous kick and hit the woodwork trying to clear it but Danny Lima made no mistake as he crashed over to score moments after coming off the bench.

The sin-binning of Simon Finnigan for a late challenge on Briers then gave Warrington the incentive to increase their lead with two more tries before half-time.

Mark Gleeson crossed by the posts after inadvertently wrong-footing the Widnes defence by slipping and then spotting a better angle of run when regaining his feet.

Kohe-Love then strode over just before the interval to make the score, which also included three conversions from Bridge, 26-4.

Things got much worse for Widnes just after the restart when Wolves full-back Brent Grose took a pass in his own in-goal area and ran the whole length of the field to score.

Fa?afili then claimed his second from a Martin Gleeson pass, completing a simple move that suggested the floodgates were about to open.

Martin Gleeson forced his way over as Warrington again cut the home defence open and Paul Wood then met little resistance to score his side?s ninth try.

Seventeen-year-old Chris Riley then found space on the left to claim his first Wolves try and Kohe-Love got his second of the game after a Vikings error.

Kerr and Finnigan grabbed late consolations, to ironic cheers from the Warrington fans, but the reality had long since dawned on the home side.

Widnes: J. O?Neill, Watts, Connolly, Hughes, Viane, Myler, Kerr, J. O?Neill, Smith, Nash, Cassidy, Frame, Finnigan. Replacements: Emelio, Whitaker, Mills, Alcock.

Warrington: Grose, Fa?afili, M. Gleeson, Kohe-Love, Bridge, Briers, N. Wood, Leikvoll, M. Gleeson, P. Wood, Swann, Westwood, Clarke. Replacements: Riley, Bracek, Hilton, Lima.

Widnes: 16 (4) Tries: Hughes, Kerr, Finnigan. Goals: Myler 2.

Warrington: 60 (26) Tries: Fa'afili 2, Westwood, Lima, M. Gleeson, Kohe-Love 2, Grose, M. Gleeson, P. Wood, Riley. Goals: Bridge 8.

Attendance: 7,878

Referee: Richard Silverwood (Dewsbury)

Thanks to www.superleague.co.uk for the above review