THREE was the magic number for Leigh at the Sports Village on Sunday as they accounted for Featherstone Rovers with an ultimately comfortable 52-18 victory.

Fuifui Moimoi and Ryan Brierley both claimed hat-tricks as Leigh cruised to their third win in a week to open up a two-point advantage over Bradford Bulls at the top of the Kingstone Press Championship ahead of Sunday's clash.

Leigh made a positive start and opened the scoring after seven minutes when a long pass from Bob Beswick set up Moimoi to gallop over.

Martyn Ridyard added the first of seven goals but Rovers struck back, restricting the Centurions yardage while Leigh compounded matters with a number of mistakes.

Featherstone scored their first try after 10 minutes when Jy Hitchcox kicked through for Brad England to win the race.

Paul Sykes goaled and as the error count mounted for Leigh, the scoreboard went against them too when Samoan international Reni Maitua split the defence and Ian Hardman went over in support.

Leigh grasped the challenge and it was Gregg McNally who stepped up to the plate.

The in-form fullback scored five tries in a midweek win against Hunslet and created one at the right corner for former Rovers centre Greg Worthington. The Cumbrian then found a way through with some wonderful individual footwork for his 23rd try of the campaign and Ridyard again showed good form with the boot.

Brilliant support play brought two tries for Ryan Brierley before half-time with Ridyard goaling to stretch the advantage to 28-12.

Early in the second half, Moimoi stepped forward again, firstly charging through the middle for an emphatic finish from 15 metres and then dragging three defenders over from closer range for a treble.

After opening up a 40-12 lead, Leigh became guilty of overplaying, even inviting their opposition to run at them, however when they needed to step things up the Centurions were more than capable.

An attack deep in the Leigh half looked like it might end with points for Featherstone, however a loose pass went beyond England and McNally kicked the ball on before winning the race and showing great presence of mind to put Brierley in for a breakaway try.

Ridyard converted brilliantly to finish his haul.

The Centurions then saw tries for Worthington and Barlow brought back after fine work from Jonny Pownall and McNally respectively.

Rovers stemmed the tide with a fine try of their own when Sykes broke and released Ben Blackmore to the line, but Leigh finished the stronger with Kurt Haggerty contesting his own high kick and amidst the fall out Gareth Hock scooped up and danced past one defender on his way to the line for prop Jake Emmitt to convert from under the posts.

Centurions: McNally, Pownall, Worthington, Armstrong, Kay; Ridyard, Brierley; Moimoi, Beswick, Emmitt, Haggerty, Dixon, Hock. Subs: Higham, Barlow, Wilkes, Hopkins.

Referee: Chris Kendall

Attendance: 4,127