Young Aboriginals left to freeze in Wigan

Barla 30 Australia Aboriginals 6

Britain's amateurs, as might have been expected, coped much better with the extreme weather conditions here in Wigan yesterday than Australian tourists unused to icy gales. After a close first half, the Aboriginals froze in the second to allow a well-organised British side to run away with the first of their two-Test series, with the West Hull pair Terry Lynn and Scott Fletcher, at the heart of most of their good work.

It was Lynn's break that created the game's first try for Anthony Broadhead, but the tourists equalised when Alan Daley picked himself up from a half-completed tackle to go over.

The young Aboriginal side exerted plenty of pressure from a series of penalties near the British line, but the pivotal moment of the game came when the home side broke out of defence to score through Lee Morton just before half-time.

The second half was a one-sided and increasingly irritable affair that swung irretrievably Barla's way when Lynn and Darren Mitchell set up Paul Toole.

The Aboriginals would have done much better if they had responded to the running of their hooker, Jimmy Storer. Instead they lost their pattern and went further behind to Phil Hasty's try.

With Nathan Smith in the sin-bin, but their trainer, the old Castleford and Australian forward, Ronnie Gibbs, on the field as much as most of their players, they conceded two further tries to Fletcher and Lynn before they retreated to the warmth of the dressing rooms.

Barla: Moreton; Thacker, Corfield, Robinson, Toole; Hasty, Lynn; Dancer, Mitchell, M Taylor, Halmshaw, S Fletcher, Broadhead. Substitutes used: Crowe, G Fletcher, Davidson, Aramayo.

Australia Aboriginals: Conway; King, Albury, Champion, Holden; Standen, P Taylor; Smith, Storer, Lake, Daley, Armstrong, Wellington. Substitutes used: Clarke, Lacey, Webb, Grant.

Referee: C Walker (Oldham).