COMPETITION holders Leigh Centurions sneaked into the last 16 of the Northern Rail Cup despite winning only half of their group games.

The Centurions qualified for the knockout stage of the competition as one of the best third-placed teams, giving them the chance to progress and defend the trophy they won at Blackpool last July.

Sunday's 11-try victory over bottom club London Skolars was enough to see them through, but there was little in Leigh's performance to indicate that they will progress much farther.

Although they scored some quality tries, Leigh's overall display was a mirror-image of the erratic form they have shown so far this season.

Team boss Darren Shaw was rightly critical of the way his side allowed the Skolars to score three second-half tries after Leigh had set off at better than a point a minute for more than half an hour.

But sloppy defending in the middle of the field presented tries for the Skolars to Steve Green, Dave Brown and Gareth Honor - an element of the game that will be a major concern at Hilton Park with a tough league programme starting in just over a week's time.

The upside of their performance was the continued development of new half-backs Martin Ainscough and Aaron Heremaia. Both were at the hub of Leigh's better passages of attacking play, benefiting from a good platform built by props Warren Stevens and Dana Wilson.

Stand-off Ainscough finished with two tries while Heremaia played a key role in several of Centurions other scores.

Centre Dave Alstead picked up a hat-trick and there were also two apiece from leading scorer Miles Greenwood and second rower Tommy Grundy.

Chris Hill and Leroy Rivett both touched down in the first half as Leigh built up a commanding 38-6 interval lead, but the home side were never quite as dominant again after the break as their own repeated errors and more determination from the Skolars reduced the margin of victory.