Tigers denied late on at Catalans

Castleford Tigers put in a battling display at Stade Gilbert Brutus but were agonisingly beaten late on in their Round 7 Super League contest.

The visitors had the first opportunity straight from kick-off after the ball, fortunately, bounced back towards them. Tom Davies threatened with a run down the right but was stopped in his tracks by a Jordan Turner tackle and the kick left on the last was caught by Bureta Faraimo.

Just a few minutes later however they claimed the opener. Catalans took the play right into the hands of Davies who look dangerous again as he placed a low kick in behind and chased it down. The winger acrobatically slapped the ball back into play and Paul Seguier was the man in the right place at the right time to dot down. Keighran made no mistake from the tee to give the hosts an early 6-0 lead.

Cas showed incredible grit and determination to force an error from the Dragons and capitalised. The Tigers shifted the ball right which initially went to ground, however, Jack Broadbent reacted quickest to pick up and race over to the delight of the travelling Fords faithful. With Gareth Widdop absent it was captain Paul McShane who had his kicking boots on, and he duly pulled the Tigers level.

It was a back-and-forth first half as this time it was Catalans' turn to attack, however, winger Tom Johnstone found Cesar Rouge’s pass out wide too hot to handle.

Castleford were soon up the other end as Broadbent displayed his attacking prowess with a brilliant break and offload to George Griffin to get the Fords inside the Catalans 20. The away team decided to run the ball on the last with Alex Mellor having a dig at the line, but the second row was stopped short.

The home side were awarded the opportunity to nudge ahead after the referee penalised Castleford for a late hit on the kicker. Keighran grabbed the ball and elected to go for the posts and put the Dragons back ahead.

Catalans kept their foot on the gas and extended their lead further 25 minutes in. A kick forward forced the Tigers into conceding a drop out which was followed by Rouge popping the ball out to Johnstone for the winger to go over in the corner. With the blustery conditions, Keighran had a tough task from the tee and was unlucky to see his conversion drift just wide.

As the end of the first half ticked closer the hosts thought they had scored again as Davies acrobatically attempted to ground the ball out on the right-hand side. Jacob Miller put in a superb defensive effort to get across and force the winger out of play for the scores to read 12-6 at the break.

It was a nightmare start to the second half for the Tigers. Only three minutes in and a dancing Arthur Mourgue was dazzling the Castleford defence as he stepped away from Mellor to find space and darted over on the left. Keighran was finding it difficult to locate his kicking boots on the day as he missed the conversion.

The wind was in the Dragons’ sails with captain Benjamin Garcia ploughing forward and setting an attacking base. Davies looked clear in to score but was denied again, this time it was a crunching tackle from Turner that smashed him off the field.

After soaking up a period of Catalans pressure the Fords responded in style. Fonua looked like he was going to be put into touch but smuggled away an offload to Eden and the full-back found the hands of Turner who stretched out to ground. McShane made no mistake to add the extras and get the Fords within four.

Typically, that fired up the Dragons as they forced the Tigers into having to defend back-to-back sets on their line. Castleford’s steely determination kept them at bay, and they went one better a few minutes later.

Broadbent was in dazzling form on the day from half-back and stunned Catalans by going 80 metres, stepping Mourgue and raced over to score a memorable try. McShane had the easy task of knocking over the conversion from in front of the sticks to get Cas into the lead.

Unfortunately for the Fords they couldn’t keep hold of their advantage after they were penalised on halfway and Catalans took full advantage. Mike McMeeken took a short ball just a metre out and bulldozed over to steal the game late on and Mourgue slotted the conversion for the full-time scores to read 22-18.

Catalans: Mourgue, Davies, Keighran, Laguerre, Johnstone, Rouge, Pearce, McMeeken, Da Costa, Bousquet, Whitley, Seguier, Garcia

Interchanges: Navarrete, Chan, Dezaria, Tomkins

Tries: Seguier, Johnstone, Mourgue, McMeeken

Goals: Keighran (2/4), Mourgue (1/1)

Castleford: Eden, Faraimo, Mellor, Turner, Fonua, Broadbent, Miller, Massey, McShane, Matagi, Griffin, Edwards, Westerman

Interchanges: Lawler, Mustapha, Vete, Smith

Tries: Broadbent x2, Turner

Goals: McShane (3/3)