Giants boss Nathan Brown's column: Consolidation is key

Jul 16 2009 by Chris Roberts, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

On Sunday, you head into the home game with Warrington third in the Super League table with just seven games of the regular season remaining, and you’ll soon be preparing for a Challenge Cup semi-final. Is it safe to assume you’d have taken that if it had been offered to you at the start of the year?

I’m sure quite a lot of clubs would have settled for that, not just ourselves!

To be honest, with this being my first season over here, I didn’t really know what to expect.

We didn’t have any great goals. We just wanted to try and get some consistency as a group of people and get some improvements.

Obviously where we are in the table at the moment would suggest the players are achieving those two things.

We had a small down period not so long ago. But we’ve won our last three, and winning games helps you get a little bit higher.

Do you think there’s any possibility you could finish any higher than third in the table?

I honestly believe the teams that are one and two (St Helens and Leeds) will run one and two.

The aim for us is to consolidate where we are in the next three weeks, and that will put ourselves in a position where the top four is a reality.

When Warrington and the other sides on 20 play us and (fourth-placed) Hull KR, they will be looking at it as a four-point game because of what it can do for them and their season.

The reality is that, if we beat the sides on 20 points, they’ve no chance of catching us, because our ’for and against’ is far better than theirs.

It would give us a big break on a good side like Warrington. But, if the result goes the other way, Warrington naturally come a little bit closer and put themselves in a good position.

The reality is, if we win our share of games the worst-case scenario is a top-four finish.

If we can keep ourselves up where we are, we can re-evaluate and plan to do well down the track in the semis.