I DON’T think anyone will be surprised to hear we’ve been worked hard in training this week.
And none of us has complained about it, because we know we’ve deserved it!
Although we do all genuinely feel there was an improvement in the way we played at Bradford – despite the scoreline, of course – we know we’re still nowhere near our best, and this week has been spent trying to address the problems.
It doesn’t really take a genius to see the main problem against the Bulls was our defence.
The harsh reality of the stats has revealed we missed twice as many one-on-one tackles as Bradford, and we failed to prevent the likes of Sam Burgess and Andy Lynch offloading in the tackle.
Against the Bulls that’s a cardinal sin.
As a result we’ve been taking steps to rectify this, and let’s all hope we find this work has paid off when we take to the field against Castleford Tigers at the Galpharm on Sunday.
It’s a game we’re all looking forward to playing, because it’s the chance to get our season up and running after two false starts.
And it would, of course, help to silence all those who have used our opening defeats to Leeds and Bradford to resurrect all the talk of our awful start to last season when we lost seven on the trot!
That was an awful time for us, and we certainly don’t want a repeat of that.
But even though this is our chance to get win No1 on the board, we know the Tigers will have something to say about that.
Like us, they’re also looking to get their first win on the board, and after what was a highly encouraging display at Wigan last Friday when they were pretty unlucky to lose 28-16, I’m sure they’ll be making the short trip with their confidence intact.
They also showed the week before against Catalans that they’re no mugs, and we know that if we fail to keep improving Castleford could make us pay.
In the pre-season game over at their place they showed what a cracking attacking side they can be as they led 16-0 against us in the first half, and we know we have to avoid that this time around.
But we’re determined we won’t let that happen.
We know we’re a good side and that as soon as we hit form we’ll be a massive force in the Super League competition.
As I’ve said, we’ve been worked extremely hard this week all week, despite the unfriendly weather.
Our usual outdoor training pitches have been frozen solid for much of the week, which could have been a big problem for us.
Luckily, we have been able to use the Sportsbarn on Leeds Road to do our skills work, and also the new ‘Zone’ near the stadium.
It’s obviously not quite like training on a full-size pitch outside, but it’s definitely the next best thing.
So, we’re hoping that works to our advantage and that we are a little sharper than Castleford when we get away.
And as well as wanting to win to get our season up and running, we also want to put on a show for our magnificent fans.
The backing we received for our opening home game against Leeds was absolutely sensational.
It was obviously a massive shame we couldn’t back it up with the display to match. That hurt, I can tell you.
But Sunday is our chance to make up for it. We’re determined to do so.
