The Hawks took to the field expecting a tough challenge from league newcomers Kendal, and the visitors didn't disappoint.

After some cagey early exchanges, Kendal opened the scoring when Leigh's failure to deal with a deep kick put them on the back foot, the unconverted Try being scored in the corner with crisp handling from the resulting lineout.

The game then ran through a period of direct forward play with strong running from the likes of Howard, Erskine and Caine taking the game to the visitors. Leigh then hit back, when from a midfield scrum a short ball from Roberts found Carson at full speed who offloaded, when tackled, to the supporting Roberts, he in turn offloaded to Greenwood for a score which went unconverted.

Leigh failed to capitalise from the good work done and it was the visitors who raised their game playing what remained of the half in Leigh territory scoring two more tries one directly from a scrum, and one from a Leigh error, both which were converted to leave the score 19-5 at half time.

Staring defeat in the face, the Hawks then began to take a grip on the game and opened the half much the stronger and as stand off Roberts came to the fore, only poor handling stopped the Hawks hitting back immediately.

After some sustained pressure it was Kendal again who capitalised on some poor tackling to extend their lead with a fine long range try 24-5. With 15 minutes left, it was up to man of the match Carson to show his class sprinting clear from his own half to score a fine try under the sticks for Greenwood to convert, and then cleverly capitalised on a poor clearance kick to score an unconverted try and close the gap to seven points with three minutes remaining.

From the kick off Leigh were awarded a scrum on their own 22 and a deep box kick won a line out five metres from the Kendal line. A clean catch set up a ruck, and Howard came steaming through on a short ball to score in the dying seconds. Greenwood managed to convert and tie the scores.