The Rugby league-viewing public of Workington contributed to the afternoon's all-round low-key feel by staying away in droves - just 336 hardy souls suffering this test of patience.

Despite a well below par performance, Hornets had way too much in the tank for ToWn and ambled around to win at a canter, but Workington played a simple, straightforward game that frustrated Hornets for the first 20 minutes. But Hornets contributed to the slow start. Sloppy handling and rudimentary errors were staple stuff - Casey Mayberry committing the most ludicrous offence: Caught in two minds whether to catch a harmless touch-finder or not, he eventually came up with the worst of both worlds - flapping at the ball whilst stepping into touch. Hally had seen enough and hauled him off.

The deadlock was broken after 25 minutes - a superb flat pass from Watson to Smith, a delayed pass to Southern; ta very much. Ten minutes later strong running fron Dave Larder close-in was enough to see him score, but the try on the hooter demonstrated what Hornets can do when they engage overdrive: neat interpassing between Nanyn, Pachniuk and Smith swept Hornets 80 metres upfield for Matt Leigh to take the final pass and score.

Half time 18-0; game over and Hornets had hardly broken sweat.

It was Workington who started the second half the brighter - but as their first attack seemed to be fizzling out, Sice's long pass was partially intercepted by Roper, the loose ball falling to Johnson a yard out for him to fall in unopposed. Pretty awful really. Normal service was resumed up the other end.

First Southern took a short pass to sleepwalk through a static defence; then Watson linked and dummied through to score; followed a minute later by Smith who skated in to ease Hornets past the 30 mark.

On the hour, Workington hacked the ball through, winger Huddart gathered and seemingly had 70 yards of open field in which to pick his spot, but he was chased down by Dave Larder who executed a perfect cover tackle. With Huddart rushing to play the ball and Hornets' defence still coming back, Larder shoved him over and walked to the dugout for his ten minutes - without even waiting for the referee to go for the Yellow card.

Workington sent in three big drives and scrum-half Burns suckered the Hornets defence with a slump from 18 inches.

Hornets returned the favour four minutes later as Pachniuk dived in from acting half, and the account was closed with five minutes remaining as simple passing created room for Nanyn to score.

The adage says that you can only play the opposition in front of you - and a 34 point win at Workington is the stuff that we die-hards only used to dream of - but this was, over-all, a ponderous training run that deliverd the bare essential: a win. Hally won't be too chuffed about the stupid mistakes or the lack of concentration on defence that allowed Workington into double figures. But we can't complain too much.

A small Hornets contingent in a pitifully tiny crowd saw us win - and that's all we ever want isn't it? And at least the sun shone all day - which is nice.