WINDERMERE made such a bright start that a comfortable home win looked on the cards at Dawes Meadow but in the end Greengarth made them fight all the way.

After a string of poor performances, this was an improved showing by Windermere and came as a great relief.

The front row gave Greengarth a hard time in the early scrums and fly-half Jonothan Cooper sparked off several good attacks with good support from Jeremy Wood and Martyn Montford in the back, and No. 8 Joe Sheasby.

There were some near- misses, Montford and Sheasby going close before full-back Matthew Nield gave Windermere the lead with a fine individual try from 45 yards out. He gathered a loose kick from Greengarth fly-half Temple and set off intending to link up with his threequarters.

He feinted to pass the ball on but when a hole opened up in the defence he shot through it to sprint on to the posts. Cooper landed the simple conversion.

Sheasby continued to shine for Windermere with his breaks from the scrum and he instigated the next try, well finished-off by Cooper, who again improved the score.

Determined play by the visitors made sure Windermere did not have things all their own way, however. Their well-organised pack drove downfield and Norton forced his way over from close range following a short penalty.

So Windermere began the second half leading 14-7 and quickly went further ahead with a penalty by Cooper.

Back came Greengarth only for a dropped pass to deny them a seemingly certain try following a neat break by Temple.

Cooper had the final say when he stepped through the visitors' defence for his second try of the match.

Hooker Danny Harrison and prop Simon Bragg, along with Joe Sheasby and Danny Blenkharn, were prominent in the Windermere pack, while Cooper finished a good performance with a personal tally of 17 points.