NORTHWICH RUFC entertained high flying Wilmslow at Moss Farm on Saturday and came away on the wrong end of a 62-0 defeat.

Northwich continued to suffer from absenteeism and injury with five senior players unavailable for the match and the problems were further compounded with the late withdrawal of Nick Blake and Ricky Evans with pre-match injuries.

Facing a strong Wilmslow side with sights on promotion this was always going to be a tough encounter and so it proved.

Wilmslow took an early lead with a penalty and this was quickly added to when a well worked move from a lineout created space for the Wilmslow fly half to score close to the posts.

The Wilmslow half backs took control and on 30 minutes they stretched the lead when the centre made a midfield break and sent his winger in for a try.

This was followed five minutes later when, after a series of rucks, the visiting fly half found himself in open space and scored under the posts.

At this point Northwich lost influential number eight Graham Robinson with a knee injury and Wilmslow finished the half with a further try from a quickly taken penalty near the Northwich line to take a 29-0 lead at half time.

Northwich made an encouraging start to the second half but after good pressure the ball was stolen and the Wilmslow scrum half found a gap to score.

The departure of Chaz Wood and an injury to Chris James (who battled on) meant a further reshuffle of the team.

Things went from bad to worse when Gareth Davies was sin binned for dissent and despite all efforts a further five Wilmslow tries were scored.

Northwich now face a bottom of the league clash at Warrington on Saturday with kick off at 3pm.