Bet the pitch is rock hard again.  In summer it's like concrete despite the lush grass covering.  

Ott & Peposhi make the 17. Meadows 18th man

Good to see the boys get back to winning ways with a hard-fought victory over a determined Batley side. While the scoreboard suggests a comfortable win, it was anything but straightforward.

I felt that we started sluggishly, with poor discipline in the first half keeping Batley well in the contest. Time and again, needless penalties invited pressure and allowed the Bulldogs to gain territory without having to earn it. Batley spent more time in our half courtesy of our own mistakes than through any real momentum of their own.

I also thought our ball retention left much to be desired. Promising sets were squandered with handling errors and poor decision-making.

How Batley didn’t lose a man in the opening exchanges is a mystery. Manning dangerously dropping Michael Lawrence on his head within the opening few minutes, and not long after, Brown caught Holmes with a high shot.

Batley must be credited for their defensive efforts during the game. They showed real steel on their own line and never threw in the towel.

My highlights were our defensive efforts. I felt that we defended superbly when it mattered most, particularly on our own line. Armitage was clinical out wide, finishing with confidence, helped by a sharp passing game from Keyes, who constantly asked questions of the Batley defence and created 3 great scoring opportunities for Armitage. Jordan Lilley’s goal-kicking was another highlight, slotting them over from all angles — a marked improvement after recent weeks. Tom Holmes also had a good game and grabbed a nice solo try late on.

All in all, a scrappy but crucial win to keep pressure on Toulouse. Another huge game coming up next weekend away at Barrow.

2pts that's the bottom line.  But Batley really are the poorest team we've faced this season and they really made it a dogfight at times.


Armitage took all his tries well.  I'd love to see what he could do in the centres.  Holmes great enthusiasm and pace at fullback.   Thought Bayliss had a good game and Waine was decent when he was given a chance.   Lilley's goalkicking was great too.  Also though Blake was great in defence, I wish we could get him more ball in attack. 


On the negative side we were really scruffy with our handling and  our ends to sets and against a better team we'd really get punished.   Out PTB was too slow with our players put on their back too much. Credit is Batley for their effort.  


We could've had a lot more points if we'd had better support play too.  A lot of times we seemed to be standing back and admiring rather than backing up.


Plenty to work on. We had to work really hard.   Think were lacking impact players, we really miss Doro and to a lesser extent Pele.

Being brutally honest, I thought we were poor tonight. Batley are a poor team. They try, but have absolutely no quality within their team. If we played anyone with some quality, we'd be looking at a very different result tonight. I just thought we looked sluggish and the execution was poor. We don't look synched as a team. 


I'd be amazed if we extend Hurrells loan. The guy can barely walk! 


Positives: Holmes looks sharp. Blake's defence got us out of a few situations  number of times. 


Massive Improvement needed for next week though, otherwise it will be yer another defeat to Barrow.