Hull KR Willie Peters wants his players to view their recent heroics against Warrington as a minimum standard to aim for – and stressed the importance of backing it up against Castleford Tigers.
Second-placed Rovers face the tenth-placed Tigers at Craven Park on Friday night, with the visitors having improved in recent months, including a decent performance in a 13-12 loss against Hull KR in late June. That Castleford performance came after they had lost narrowly to Wigan – and, straight after the Rovers game, they won three in a row against St Helens, London Broncos and Catalans Dragons.
Asked about whether he wants to send a message to his players about not under-estimating Castleford, Peters replied: “Yes, absolutely, but I think It’s more about us. When you put in a performance in like we did last week against Warrington, that needs to be that minimum standard now. We are coming back to Craven Park and we expect the players to perform at that level again. We expect that every week. And they expect that themselves.
“We respect Cas, we know what they bring, we had a really tight game against them last time, but it’s about us.”
Peters was asked about Rovers’ current defensive record being the best in Super League – in terms of fewest points conceded – heading into this game, and he replied: “We are very happy with that but we’ve got a game against Cas in which they are going to ask a lot of questions and throw the ball around, we are going to be tested again, so we need to back it up, that’s important.
“We are letting in under 13 points a game which is a nice stat to have but it doesn’t mean too much if you go out and then you leak X amount of points a week. You need to be consistent with that every week. We’ll always look at our defence first.
“We love it when our crowd get behind us off the back of a kick-chase, when we go after teams. That sets up out attack, it’s definitely not the other way around.”
On the Castleford revival, Peters said: “They’ve had a lot of new personnel come in, they’ve recruited well. Then they’ve got a really good balance now of players in that team. They’ve got two hookers that run the ball and ask questions off quick play-the-balls, they’ve got a settled halves pairing now, who have managed the game well, and there’s a bit of strike there now. They’ve got Tex Hoy, who is having a really good season since he’s moved over to Cas. And guys like Joe Westerman who have been around for a while now. They like to move the ball so they ask a lot of questions.
“Craig Lingard is doing a great job. They had a slow start then they went to the market and brought in new players so that was a good sign – he saw there was a gap there in certain positions, and there were certain things that he wanted. And then they played a good brand.”
Rovers star Mikey Lewis spoke about Castleford, saying: “We’ve got to bring our running legs because they’re going to throw the ball about.”
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