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Posted: Monday 19th October 2020

Powell reflects on Hull FC defeat

Head Coach of Castleford Tigers Daryl Powell spoke to the press following Sunday afternoon's 48-6 defeat to Hull FC.

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You can watch Daryl review the match, for free, on Tigers TV - HERE.

Daryl, could you give us your assessment of the match and your side’s performance?

“It was a tough game and obviously the start just rattled us going 12-0 in no time and we couldn’t really find a way back in and the kick tries we conceded were damaging all the way through the game so it was disappointing. We’re in a real tough situation at the moment but we have got to find a way out of it, we play Thursday, Monday and Friday so it isn’t changing much we just got to keep our resolve. I think we’ve got a lot of players who are working exceptionally hard, everybody is working hard but we’ve got too many players who are not playing well and a couple of young bucks out there today on the wings.

“Hull kicked the ball really effectively to score some points in and around those young fellas but there is no blame there attached to the young fellas, they have got some outstanding players on those edges who caused us a lot of trouble. I thought we worked hard to try and get back into the game but they were too strong for us today and we’re not playing with a lot of confidence that’s clear and it’s understandable, we’ve just got to find a way to improve and we’ve got some players who desperately need to improve their performance level."

Does the scoreline give a true reflection of the contest?

“You’ll always hear coaches talking about conceding kick tries and we did quite a lot today, but they are tries aren’t they, and you’ve got to be able to defend a little bit better. They were just so much better at turning little errors from us into either points or field position. For as hard as we’re working, things are not going our way for different reasons at the moment. I’m not making excuses, we’ve got out Derrell Olpherts, James Clare, Greg Eden, Sosaia Feki and Pete Mata’utia are all outside backs, so it’s tough. We seem to be having a glut of injuries in certain positions and today, outside backs wise, it was tough, but we just kept working. I think it blew out a bit more than it deserved but that is our biggest loss of the season by a distance and it makes next Thursday’s game against Hull KR, we know we’re not going to get in the four now that’s clear but that is an important game for us.

Jake Trueman and Danny Richardson were back together in the halves, do you think they will get better with more game time together?

“I think they will be better for the run and they worked hard today, and both did some really good things. Kicking game for example, when you’re under pressure and haven’t done it for a fair few weeks is hard and we could have kicked a bit better which could have managed changed the focus of the game.

“We’ve got so much improvement in us and it’s really frustrating at the moment but we can’t make any excuses and we’ve got to crack on with what we’re doing and get better.”

Were you pleased Tyla Hepi and Jacques O’Neill who really putting in a lot of effort even towards the end of the game?

“I thought Tyla was a standout and I thought he was great, defensively I thought he really went after the opposition and I think he’s one of those players who gets under the skin of the opposition and they want to go and belt him because he runs so hard, he’s got a couple of offloads in his game as well. I thought Jacques played really well when he went to #9, I mean predominantly he has been a #9 but I’ve sort of moved him into #13 and I think having both positions in his armoury is really good for him. Those two have been exceptional and I thought Adam Milner was great.

“We’re working hard, nobody wants to lose, professional rugby league players don’t want to lose and it’s happening to us; as a team and to me as a coach more than I’ve ever experienced and I think us as a team are not used to losing and it’s tough for us. I’d ask everybody to realise that we’re working our backsides off and clearly, we want to win games, that’s not happening for us at the moment.”

You’ve mentioned confidence at the minute, how do you improve that?

“I think we’ve got to keep demanding high standards from each other, we’re not going to get out of it by feeling sorry for ourselves or not working hard I think we’ve just got to demand high standards. We’re not training that much at the moment with our next three games it’s going to be one training session team run and then we’re straight into a game. We’ve got to build our confidence through performance, we’re not going to get it through training and a lot of that goes on in players’ heads. I’ve got to make sure I give them the right messages and we could with a win, building wins helps to build confidence and we need to start that on Thursday that’s for sure.

Who could be back for Thursday’s match? Will Liam Watts be available?

“I don’t think so, he’ll come back in Monday and we’ll have a look at him and then we’ll take it from there, we’ve got Oli Holmes another one who probably won’t play this week so a couple of key boys there. Derrell Olpherts will potentially come back, James Clare and Greg Eden, three players who should be available for Thursday’s game.”