Last week, Bobbie Goulding said his side had to learn how to play for 80 minutes.

This week, his virus ravaged, patched up team - Goulding himself missing with the same bug - wrung every last drop of effort out of every one of those 80 minutes to swipe the game from under Workington's noses.

Twice overcoming a ten point deficit, this victory was a reward for self belief and a never say die attitude with Jim Elston the dynamo at the heart of this quite astonishing win.

From the off, Workington played simple direct football that pinned Hornets back in their own half. But indecision and sloppy handling let Hornets off the hook and, after 8 minutes, they took full advantage as Elston threaded John Cookson in by the posts.

Town hit straight back and spent the next half hour camped in Hornets' half. After 15 minutes a seemingly speculative cross-field kick was lost in the air by Alex Brown, leaving Blair to sweep in and score. Shortly afterwards Mossop ran onto a well-timed Campbell pass for a well-worked try; then Forber unzipped a flat-footed defence to send Wilson in under the black dot.

16-6 to the home side, Hornets only other chance gone when Wayne Corcoran was deemed to have been held up over the line.

Despite mounting a substantial rearguard action, Hornets' battered troops were still - just - in touch with the game. And within five minutes of the restart, had taken full advantage of the home side's generosity.

Just two minutes into the half, Martin Ainscough launched a line-clearing downtown kick. Town winger Blair brought the ball away, but under pressure from AInscough coughed the ball and the grateful Hornets out-half ran it back under the Workington posts. Carl Sneyd converted.

Two minutes later, Town were attacking down their right flank: a two man overlap certain to create problems for Hornets. But instead of his winger, ex-Hornet Iain Marsh sent the pass straight into the arms of Andy Gorey who gleefully sprinted 60 metres to score a sitter. Sneyd added the extras and Hornets were in front at 18-16.

This jolted Workington into life and they had, probably, their most cohesive spell. FIrstly, Lunt hit the Hornets defence with a real sucker puncgh from acting haf back.
Then - on 70 minutes - an inch-perfect cut-out pass saw Dawes squeeze in by the flag to reassert the home side's 10 point advantage.

With the sizeable travelling support praying for a miracle, Hornets sucked in to deliver the most unlikely last eight minutes. Forcing an error deep in Workington territory, Hornets worked the ball through hands and prop Andy Marsh hit the line in the centre chanmel to crash in. Sneyd added a superb conversion to close the gap to four points with two minutes remaining.

Hornets looked to have condemned themselves to defeat as Alex Brown coughed the kick-off possession in centre field. And with the seconds dripping away, Workington only had to play out the clock.

But a random pass from acting half was snaffled by the lurking Chris Forster, who pinned back his ears and headed for the posts. Just outpacing th gathering cover, Forster's try tied the scores at 28 all. Carl Sneyd showed cool composure to slot his fifth conversion from five attempts and the home side were shattered.

Hornets gathered possession from the short kick-off and played down the last seconds of the clock for a tremendous victory.

The ecstatic Hornets fans gave their side a deserved ovation as they left the field and - as Workington were left to wonder what the hell happened - one Hornets fan was heard to cheekily comment: "It was never in doubt".