Castleford Tigers hope they can be recharged and refreshed for their return to action at home to newly crowned Betfred Challenge Cup winners Wigan Warriors on Friday night.
After a disappointing display at Leeds Rhinos in their last match, head coach Craig Lingard is demanding an improved effort back at the Mend-A-Hose Jungle where Cas have beaten Hull, London Broncos and Salford Red Devils this season.
But they face a tough task against opponents now buoyed by their cup success on top of winning the World Club Championship earlier in the year and the Super League title in 2023.
And the size of it can be seen as the Tigers have already tasted defeat three times against the Warriors in 2024 – losing 60-6 last time out in the Challenge Cup after a 32-4 loss at home on the opening day of the league season and a 36-14 reverse at Wigan in April.
This Friday’s match marks the start of a tough run of fixtures for Cas as they follow up with games against Hull KR and St Helens that will further test how their rebuilding is going.
Tigers boss Lingard was unhappy with many aspects of the most recent performance at Headingley, but believes his side have been making some progress.
He said: “Other than the game against Leeds I think we have been making steady progress and small strides here and there.
“It is just where we are as a group that we are not good enough at the minute to be consistent enough on a regular basis.
“We knew with the squad that we have got that it was going to be a tough season and a development season and that is what it is proving to be.
“We are hoping this consistency we have had more of over the past five weeks, we can make it a bit more regular.
“The next month is going to be tough for us. We have got Wigan, Hull KR and St Helens coming up. It is a tough period of fixtures for us but we have got to make sure that we try and do what we can to get some sort of results out of them.
“We’ve had three games already with Wigan and they have all been slightly different with different outcomes, things that have gone well and things that have gone really, really bad, so we know full well what is going to be coming at us and that effort, that determination and attitude has got to be there.”
Lingard is hoping that the week off will help him to have some players back for the Wigan game and that some will be fitter.
He added: “There’s quite a few with niggles so the break has came at a decent time for us to patch some bodies up.”
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