Super League: Adam Lawton hat-trick secures Widnes Vikings win
A hat-trick from teenager Adam Lawton helped Widnes Vikings to a 38-12 victory over London Broncos.
Last Updated: 19/07/13 11:25pm
The home side raced to a 16-0 half-time lead before holding off a mini-revival from the Broncos, with Lawton's fellow-Academy graduate Jack Owens adding two tries of his own.
Winger Owens opened the scoring after nine minutes as he went over on the right flank following good work from Joe Melllor and Rhys Hanbury.
A scrappy spell saw both sides make crucial errors before Widnes added to their lead, Mellor strolling in after latching onto Ben Kavanagh's offload.
A third Vikings' try duly followed courtesy, Lawton grabbing his first try of the night as he collected a pass from Brown before slipping over to give the hosts a comfortable interval lead.
Brown and Lawton then combined after the restart with the latter on target again before London belatedly got on the scoresheet.
Passage of play
A decent passage of play ended in former Vikings player Shane Grady going over and after adding the conversion, Ryan Shaw went over himself before again adding the extras.
The Broncos were then denied a third try in dramatic fashion after Widnes centre Stefan Marsh somehow made up the ground to put in a crucial tackle to deny Liam Colbon after he had raced 80m with the ball.
That was as good as it got for Tony Rea's side, with the Vikings scoring three more times before the final hooter.
Owens finished off a move out wide before second row Hep Cahill then crossed with 10 minutes to go.
There was still time for Lawton to seal his hat-trick with a powerful effort, with Owens converting five of the seven tries.
