TWO tries from Academy winger Owen Buckley weren't enough to stop Widnes going down 26-24 to Hull Kingston Rovers at Halton Stadium.

It was agonisng for Vikings fans to see their side lose yet again but basic errors were at the root of their defeat.

Widnes boss Francis Cummins brought back Olly Ashall-Bott in place of Rhys Hanbury at fullback with Papua New Guinea forward Wellington Albert also returned on the bench.

Co-captain Chris Houston was back in harness following the birth of his son.

Hull KR included a sprinkling of ex-Vikings in the shape of half-back Chris Atkin, back-rowers Danny Tickle and Chris Clarkson plus substitute forward Ben Kavanagh.

Ashall-Bott made an early break for Widnes but was corralled by the Rovers cover defence and the Vikings were forced to reshuffle when winger Stefan Marsh limped off after ten minutes.

Houston thought he’d opened the scoring but the referee ruled a double-movement.

Widnes took the lead when Joe Mellor was held down in the tackle allowing Krisnan Inu to boot a penalty with the incident earning Hull KR second row Danny Tickle ten minutes in the sin-bin.

Twice Inu made break but couldn’t find Mellor and Ashall-Bott with potentially try-creating passes.

Rovers levelled things up with a penalty shot of their own and then scored what turned out to be the only try of the first half when substitute James Donaldson crashed in. Tickle’s goal made it 8-2 at the break.

A poor start to the second half saw Tickle increase the visitors lead to 14-2 when he crashed in for a six-pointer.

Widnes hit back when Ashall-Bott made a searing midfield break and rounded his opposite number Adam Quinlan on a 50 metre dash to the posts.

Inu added the extras and it was game on when Danny Craven forced his way over from dummy-half to level the scores at 14-14.

Unfortunately, the Vikings were hit by a sucker punch when Quinlan’s pace was too much for Inu and he raced away for a solo score converted by Tickle.

Widnes responded again when young winger Owen Buckley climbed high to gather a Craven cross-kick but again the Vikings conceded softly as Rovers centre Liam Salter side-stepped in to male it 26-18.

A grandstand finish seemed to be in the offing when Buckley repeated his party piece and scored again for a Craven kick with Inu goalinling superbly.

A grandstand finish looked on the cards with over a minute on the clock but Charly Runciman fumbled the restart and that was that.

Widnes: Ashall-Bott; Buckley, Inu, Runciman, Marsh; Mellor, Craven; J Chapelhow, Heremaia, Dudson, Whitley, Houston Leuluai. Subs: Olbison, D Walker, Albert, T Chapelhow.

Hull KR: Quinlan; J Carney, Blair, Salter, Oakes; McGuire, Atkin; Scruton, Lee, Mulhern, Tickle, Greenwood, Clarkson. Subs: Lunt, Masoe, Kavanagh, Donaldson.

Half-time: 2-8 Referee: Mr T Grant Attendance: 4,469