By Helen Thompson

Last updated at 13:15, Monday, 26 July 2010

Workington Town chairman Dave Bowden admitted two crucial refereeing decisions helped yesterday’s hotly contested game in rivals York’s favour.

Dave Bowden

Bowden said the two incidents – the sin binning of Mike Whitehead and Scott Kaighan’s denied try – played a big part in swinging the game towards the City Knights, who went on to win 18-14.

Town did pick up an important bonus point to keep them in the Championship One play-offs in sixth position and Bowden was delighted with the effort and commitment from his players.

“It was disappointing to lose as we were in front for about 70 per cent of the game and to lose in the last two minutes from time was disappointing,” said Bowden. “But we couldn’t be disappointed about the way we played. I thought our defence was put under a lot of pressure and it performed well.

“The defining moment for me was when Mike Whitehead was sin binned for what, to me, was a soft sin binning.

“We were a man down and they scored 11 points in that time. In a game as tight as that was any referee sin binning a player needs to be sure of a good reason for it because that probably swung the game for York. Then Scott Kaighan’s full- length try, for him to run all the way down there and ground it and for nobody to give a decision until he put it down was another incident.

“There were some frustrations over these two things and they could both have won us the game.

“But overall I was pretty pleased with the performance, it is certainly something we can build on for next week and we did get a bonus point which could be important at this time of the year.”

First published at 11:24, Monday, 26 July 2010
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk