Swinton Lions battled to their first Championship victory of the season as they ran in five tries to defeat Midlands Hurricanes 28-10 at Heywood Road.
Josh Eaves and Fin Irwin scored in the final ten minutes as Swinton took a pulsating, end-to-end game out of reach to end a run of nine games without a win.
The contest had everything with some great defence on show as the Lions held off pressure from the visitors time after time.
Midlands Hurricanes had a chance on 11 minutes when Aidan McGowan broke free, but Louie Roberts halted his progress and forward Jon Luke-Kirby had a great opportunity five minutes later but knocked on near the line.
The Hurricanes continued to probe for the opening score and forced a goal-line dropout, but they would pay for their profligacy when Swinton took the lead on 21 minutes when good play saw Gibson go over on the left and Reece Briers kicked the first of four successful conversions.
The away side hit back three minutes later when Lewis Else broke through a tackle to score under the posts and Sully Medforth converted. But Lions quickly retook the lead as Briers caught a crash ball from Gibson to go over on the left and Gibson added his own conversion to open up a 12-6 lead, and heroic defending before half-time meant Anthony Woods side led by six points at the break.
Midlands Hurricanes had won seven of their Championship games and came into the fixture heavy favourites. Centre Ryan Johnson had a great chance to cut the deficit after the restart but was grounded short.
Even the most pessimistic Swinton Lions supporter must have begun to believe their first win of the season could be on the way when Tom Ratchford produced a moment of magic to score an excellent solo try to extend their lead to 16-6 with 23 minutes to play.
Isaac Shaw and Brandon Moore went close but were thwarted by tackles as more chances came and went for Hurricanes.
The Lions forced a goal-line dropout at 67 minutes, and from the kick, they put pressure on the line, which saw Josh Eaves dart over by the posts, and Briers added the simple conversion.
Head coach Anthony Murray had seen his side improve steadily since he took over from Paul Wood in March and he would have been delighted at the way the Lions went back on the attack from the restart as Eaves put out a nice short pass to send Fin Yates in by the posts as Swinton Lions established an unassailable 28-6 lead after 71 minutes.
The away side refused to lie down and kept attacking the Lions line and their endurance paid off with three minutes left when a good passing move saw Todd Horner make the best of a huge overlap to score in the right corner, but Else who had taken over the kicking was wide with his conversion.
Match report by Ian Rigg, photo taken by Swinton Lions.
