Egremont Rangers sit proudly at the top of the National Conference Premier Division.

An impressive 44-16 win at Wigan St Patrick’s maintained their excellent start to the season.

It puts them ahead of impressive newcomers Hunslet Club Parkside on points differential.

Travelling away has not been easy for Egremont, especially in the last two seasons, but they have opened the new campaign with two wins on the road.

In Wigan, they got off to the perfect start with a try inside the first minute and, by the half-hour mark, had established a 32-0 lead.

Wigan St Pat’s weren’t going to come back from that, although to be fair, they made more of a fist of it in the second half.

Loose-forward Pat Wells was the scorer in the first minute and the early blitz was continued by Marcus O’Brien (7), Fraser McNee (11), Matty Bewsher (20, 25) and Matt Hutchins (30). Bewsher added four conversions.

It looked as though the agony was going to continue for St Pat’s when McNee raced in for his second try on 42 minutes, converted by Bewsher.

But the hosts steadied themselves and came back to score three tries from Andrew Cunningham, Andy Higham and Jamie Bristoe. Two were converted by James Ratcliffe.

The last Egremont try was scored by Paul Corkhill and converted by Joe Bold.

Wath Brow Hornets got off the mark with a 28-14 home win over newcomers Underbank Rangers.

The victory was essentially made in the first half when the Brow opened up a 14-point lead.

It was too close to call in the second half with 14 points apiece.

Winger Curtis Teare was the match-winner for the Hornets with a hat-trick of tries.

It was Teare who opened the scoring after nine minutes and he was followed over by Dean Rooney and Fran King. Cole Walker-Taylor improved one.

Sam Ansell sliced trough to score for the visitors early in the second half before Teare raced over for his second.

Underbank cut the deficit to 18-8 with a second unconverted try from Joe Bobbin before Karl Dixon scored the decisive try for the hosts on 68 minutes.

When Teare completed his hat-trick four minutes later, and Walker Taylor added the conversion, it looked as though the Brow would cruise home.

But gutsy Underbank weren’t finished and they kept going to register the final score of the game.

Prop Jordan Williams went in for the final try of the game which was converted by Richard Pogson.