Dragons 38 - Tigers 4

Dragons 38 - Tigers 4

The Tigers travelled to France to take on the Catalan Dragons Saturday evening in their Round 23 BetFred Super League fixture at the Stade Brutus in Perpignan.

Castleford handed a debut to homegrown talent Alfie Lindsey. Lindsey joined the club’s scholarship and has gone through the club’s successful youth development programme, playing academy and Reserve level, including two representative games for Yorkshire in this year’s RFL origin fixtures.

Starting strong the Tigers with Daejarn Asi opening up the right-hand side and Chris Atkin, Jensen Windley and Will Tate all coupling up to send Lindsey over in the comer on debut.
The hosts drew level after twenty-five minutes as the arm-wrestle of the first half showed both sides toe-to-toe. The Dragons attack looked to have clicked into gear as the break approached when they broke down their left-side, but the last pass didn’t stick, and the score remained all-square.
With the last play of the half the Catalan go-forward reaped rewards with a converted try to lead at half time 10-4.

Tigers had some early opportunity early in the second half when Atkins footwork skills at the line saw the home side back line almost caught out. A penalty for a high shot on Windley looked to give the Tigers hope but the Dragons quickly crossed in the left corner and swing the momentum in their favour.
Catalan almost crossed again but the Tigers defence held firm and held up the hosts promise. Windley then left the field just short of the hour, and Cain Robb broke through the middle and looked to cause problems, but the home side held firm.
Back up-field, an Atkin kick on the last tackle saw Elliot Wallis attempt to reap rewards in the corner, but the Dragons held out.A Dragons 40/20 attempt on the last play saw them gain good field-position when the Tiger stalled the progress and the ball went out in-goal, but the territory for the Dragons attack saw them improve their lead with another converted try to increase the margin.
Another 40/20 attempt minutes later was successful, and the Catalan possession quickly kicked in and another converted try followed.
The Tigers did gain some field position and a kick on the last play from Asi again looked to ask questions of the Dragons, but Wallis was held up.
Repeat sets on the backline saw the Tiger stretched and back-to-back six-again’s on the tryline saw the visitors eventually breached when Alex Decosta jumped out from acting half and wrestled over to score.
A good break from Tom Amone looked to break the hosts advantage and a neat pass to Alex Mellor caused problems,  but the Dragons attack quickly found the ball and raced clear with the Tigers on the back-foot and the hosts scored another converted try in the final minute to seal a 38-4 win.

CASTLEFORD TIGERS
27 Jenson Windley
46 Alfie Lindsey (DEBUT)
25 Will Tate
22 Louis Senior
45 Elliot Wallis
6 Daejarn Asi
42 Chris Atkin
38 Brad Singleton
9 Liam Horne
41 Tom Amone
11 Jeremiah Simbiken
12 Alex Mellor
10 George Lawler

Subs (ALL USED)
15 George Griffin
16 Cain Robb
20 Muizz Mustapha
39 Hugio Salabio

Tries : Lindsey (13Min)

Referee : Liam Rush