Workington Town and Whitehaven will clash in the Northern Rail Cup at Derwent Park on Sunday, February 21.

It’s the final pool game for both Cumbrian clubs as they launch their Co-operative Championship campaigns the following week.

Town also open the pool at home to Swinton Lions on Sunday, January 31 while Whitehaven start with a home clash at the Recreation Ground against Batley Bulldogs.

Town visit Gateshead (February 7) and Keighley (February 14) in the Northern Rail while Whitehaven travel to Keighley (Feb 7) and host Doncaster (Feb 14).

Ten teams are included in each of the two Pools and Town and Whitehaven are in with Barrow, Batley, Blackpool, Doncaster, Gateshead, Keighley, Swinton and Widnes.

Pool B comprises Dewsbury, Featherstone, Halifax, Hunslet, Leigh, London Skolars, Oldham, Rochdale, Sheffield and York.
The top four teams in each pool will go into the open draw for the knock-out quarter final stage.

The Northern Rail Cup quarter finals will be played ion the week-end of June 5 and 6 with the semi-finals on June 19 and 20.

Whitehaven are the spare team on the opening week-end of the Co-operative Championship and won’t start their campaign until after the third round of the Challenge Cup.

Barrow’s trip to Leigh on Thursday, February 25 will be the first fixture which will be televised.

Their opening fixture in the Championship is on Saturday, March 13 at home to Toulouse Olympique.

Then follows:-
March  21 – Leigh (a)
March 28 – Featherstone (a)
April 1 (TV game) Barrow (h)
Easter Monday – April 5 – Widnes (a)
April 11 – Dewsbury (a)
April 25 – Halifax (h)
May 3 –Sheffield (a)
May 9 – Keighley (h)
May 16 – Batley (a)
May 23 – Leigh (h)
May 29 - Barrow (a)
June 13 – Sheffield (h)
June 26 – Toulouse (a)
July 4 – Widnes (h)
July 11 – Halifax (a)
July 25 – Featherstone (h)
August 8 – Dewsbury (h)
August 15 – Keighley (a)
August 22 – Batley (h)

---

Bookmark with: what are these?