Craig Lingard praised Rowan Milnes as the former Hull KR scrum-half starred in Castleford Tigers’ 39-20 win over Hull FC at the MKM Stadium.
Castleford were reduced to 11 players at one point in the second half but kept the home side at bay for a deserved victory which lifted them nine points clear of their hosts in the Betfred Super League table.
Lingard said: “We put a lot of pressure on Rowan Milnes to manage that game. I thought Rowan was outstanding with the way he managed the game.”
Milnes converted all of his side’s six tries, including one of his own, and also kicked a penalty and a drop goal.
Lingard said the Tigers had shown spirit to run out winners after allowing the home side to reduce the arrears to just four points in the second period.
He added: “There are loads of lessons for us to learn from that. We allowed them to come back into it. Being down to 11 and 12 men, the work they put in was everything we have been trying to do.
“We kept them scoreless other than one try. The way they handled that period was very significant for us.
“The win was significant because we had not had one in a while.”
Referee Liam Rush showed three yellow cards in the second half with two going to Castleford’s Liam Horne and Sylvester Namo and Hull’s Yusuf Aydin also spending 10 minutes in the sin bin.
Namo returned to score a try for the visitors who also touched down through Innes Senior, Jenson Windley on only his second appearance for the Tigers and a double from Tex Hoy against his former club.
Hull’s tries came from a Harvey Barron brace, Ligi Sao and Carlos Tuimavave, with two conversions coming from Jack Charles.
Simon Grix pulled no punches with an honest assessment of his side’s performance which he described as “rubbish”.
The interim coach admitted too many players made bad choices during difficult periods of the game.
He said: “The first 10 minutes there were a couple of lapses when they scored tries but for the 20 minutes after that our defence was disgraceful.
“I think people took some shortcuts and easy choices. I’ve got to be the one that comes out and fronts it.”
Hull followed up a narrow defeat to Wigan Warriors with a poor afternoon against the Tigers.
Grix added: “Last week I felt their actions really backed up their words. This week we got what we deserved. We’re in a difficult spot, we can go on about it very week.
“I don’t know how you can go out one week and give your best then next week put out that rubbish.
“Far too many lapses that are in our control. There’s a lot in our control that we’re not doing right. We hope someone else will clean it up for us, playing the victim. It’s not an overnight fix, there’s a lot of hard work ahead of us.”
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