Walmsley bags four as Halifax Panthers silence Newcastle Thunder

After a scoreless opening quarter-of-an-hour, the Panthers eventually kicked into gear as Walmsley stamped his name on the scoresheet. Cory Aston, Louis Jouffret and Joe Arundel all had their hand in the try as they opened up Newcastle’s defence before releasing Walmsley.

Despite the positive start, the Panthers were quickly pegged back as Alex Donaghy silenced the home crowd after intercepting Jouffret’s pass and scoring a 95-metre effort. A successful Josh Wood conversion put Thunder ahead.

A moment of brilliance may have given Newcastle the lead, but it was a moment of madness from Gideon Boafo which soon put Halifax back in control.

The Thunder man allowed Joe Keyes’ last tackle kick to bounce over his head and straight into the welcoming arms of Arundel who dived over the whitewash. Keyes then kicked his first conversion to give Fax a 10-6 lead.

No more than 120 seconds later, Walmsley scored his second of the afternoon. Once again it was Aston and Keyes in the thick of the action as they sliced the Newcastle defence open before releasing the Scotland international over the tryline.

Five minutes before the interval, the Panthers landed another major blow. On this occasion, it was Zack McComb who managed to spin away from Newcastle’s defence before scoring.

Fax showed no signs of stopping early in the second-half as Aston scored in his second game since returning from his loan-spell at Sheffield. The 27-year-old saw his last tackle kick spilled by Newcastle before retrieving the loose ball and powering over.

Thunder did show some resilience and they did take advantage of a Halifax error to score in the 53rd minute through Thomas Lacans.

In the last 15 minutes, the Panthers turned on the style and Walmsley completed his hat-trick in the 65th minute before Jouffret caused more damage in the 67th.

With seconds remaining, Walmsley scored a fourth as Halifax celebrated their fourth straight victory.

Halifax Panthers: Louis Jouffret, Lachlan Walmsley, Joe Arundel, Zack McComb, James Saltonstall, Cory Aston, Joe Keyes, Will Calcott, Brandon Moore, Jacob Fairbank, Ed Barber, Matt Garside, Adam Tangata. Subs: Joe Martin, Elliot Morris, Kevin Larroyer, Brad Knowles.

Newcastle Thunder: Jake Anderson, Connor Bailey, Gideon Boafo, Ted Chapelhow, Mitch Clark, Nathan Clemmitt, Alexander Donaghy, Josh Eaves, Bradley Gallagher, Umyla Hanley, Thomas Lacans, Josh McDermott. Subs: Craig Mullen, Isaac Nokes, Lewis Peachey, Ukuma Ta’ai.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​