Huddersfield Giants 52 Salford City Reds 4

Aug 23 2010 by Chris Roberts, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

HUDDERSFIELD Giants brought the curtain down on their home campaign in the regular Super League season with a 52-4 thrashing of Salford City Reds.

In the process it confirmed an opening home tie in the play-offs as coach Nathan Brown’s men secured a top-six finish.

But even though the Giants made mincemeat of struggling Salford in a nine-try rout, they were still nowhere near their best and know they’ll need to improve if they are to grab a first win at Super League’s semi-final stage for the very first time.

Although the Giants were 16-0 ahead at the break and in a totally different class to their opponents, the home side were far from impressive. In fact, they were generally way off the pace!

Much of their play was incredibly loose, giving the impression that they were just happy to go through the motions. It was as if they thought victory would be inevitable.

But the early signs suggested this might not be the case despite the Giants opening up strongly.

It was no surprise when they opened the scoring after six minutes when the lively Danny Brough collected from dummy half on the Salford 40 and scorched through before showing great strength to brush off several defenders and dive over by the posts.

Brett Hodgson converted and there were already hopes among the home fans of a first-half cricket score.

Yet the ease at the way the try came clearly had a detrimental effect on the host as they failed to perform at any sort of intensity.

As a result, it was 19 more minutes before they troubled the scorer again as substitute David Faiumu slipped a delightful ball out of the tackle in typical fashion to send Andy Raleigh racing away.

The fit-again prop then slipped the ball to the supporting Stephen Wild to score under the posts against the club he’ll be joining next season.

Hodgson converted and it was 12-0.

And that lead was increased to 16 points in the 32nd minute.

This time it was initially on the back of a lightning blind-side break from Luke Robinson.

That carved the City Reds wide open and, moments later and after Wild, Raleigh and Leroy Cudjoe were all halted on the line, David Fa’alogo crashed over in the corner from acting half-back from close range.

There were signs in the closing stages of the half, however, that the City Reds couldn’t be written off completely as Toby Adamson and Ashley Gibson both spilled the ball in outstanding positions.

But those scares were just what the Giants needed, and at the start of the second period they began to cut loose.

Within minutes of the restart, Faiumu stretched out to score from acting half after Fa’alogo and Robinson had been held up on the line.