Workington Preview

Injury-hit Bears first Cumbria away day this weekend at Workington

Workington Town v Coventry Bears Sunday 12th August

Match Preview

On Sunday, the Bears will be playing at one of the Cumbrian outposts of the game against Workington, situated on the sea facing edge of the Lake District.

This will be the Bears first trip up to Cumbria this season, although sides from that hotbed of the game featured three times in the early part of the season at Butts Park.

There was the memorable televised cup tie against Distingtonwhich the Bears won 18-8 back in February. They lost to Whitehaven in April and most disappointingly to Workington 4-52 in May, at the height, or perhaps that should be the depth, of their run of bad results.

What made it disappointing was that many fans remembered vividly the encounter at homer against Workington in the 2017 season, where the Bears were incredibly close to winning but lost 28-29 in the last few seconds.

That could have been a memorable victory, the first against a traditional Northern team, but it wasn’t to be, and we had to wait over a year until the game against Keighley for that landmark to be reached.

Coming closer back to the present, it was no surprise that the Bears winning streak came to an end against all-conquering York City Knights two weeks ago, but gave a glimpse of what they are capable of in the second half against Doncaster, but still lost due to a poor first half performance.

Town have won five out of their last six games, most recently beating Keighley, and they are handily placed in third position in the table behind York, so we know they are a good side.

The task facing the Bears then is a tough one, a lomg road trip, up against a team in form, and looking to pull back a 48 point deficit.  To make matters more difficult, Tom Tsang is missing several key players;

Zak Williams (sternum)

Mal Lloyd Jones (tooth)

Ash Bateman (undiagnosed breathing problem)

Harry Chapman (holiday)

Errol Carter (International duty for Turkey vs Serbia)

Jacob Ogden (Ankle)

Mike Russell (unavailable)

The squad that will be travelling is: 

1. Dante Morley Samuels

2. Hayden Freeman

3. Jason Bass

4. Kam Pearce Paul

5. Reece Rance

6. Paul Emmanuelli

7. Ben Stead

8. James Geurtjens

9. Liam Rice Wilson

10. Peter Ryan

11. Kieran Sherratt

12. Chris Barratt

13. Cam Stewart

14. Brad Sheridan

15. Dan Gover

16. Chris Vitalini

17. James Mason