Webster is eager to avoid '˜slugfest' Qualifiers with Hull KR

If his side can win at derby rivals Hull FC tomorrow night they at least have a chance of clawing their way into the top eight and avoiding the Qualifiers.

Indeed, they are now the only team in the bottom four who can do so with champions Leeds Rhinos, Huddersfield Giants and Salford Red Devils all consigned to the feared competition that opens up the possibility of relegation.

However, the East Yorkshire club will also need to defeat Leeds in their final regular round next Thursday and hope either Widnes Vikings, in sixth, or seventh-placed Wakefield Trinity Wildcats, do not secure a point from their remaining two games.

Even if Widnes lost to both Salford and Catalans, Denis Betts’s side would still probably survive on points difference.

It is easy to see why it already looks a little futile for Hull KR, who have raised hopes late in the day by drawing against Warrington Wolves and then winning dramatically against Huddersfield Giants last Friday.

Nevertheless, their chairman Neil Hudgell controversially suggested to The Yorkshire Post 12 months ago, ahead of the inaugural Qualifiers, that it might not be such a bad thing finishing in the bottom four and playing off against the Championship’s elite quartet for a place in Super League.

Any side that just edged into the top eight, he argued, could be onto a hiding to nothing against the leading clubs and he was proven correct as Hull FC, who nudged their way into that by winning at Rovers last July, effectively were left with a series of dead rubbers soon after the Super 8s began.

Furthermore, Hull KR – who finished 10th – ignored the threat of relegation and went on to win all seven Qualifiers games to comfortably secure their Super League place for 2016.

However, where does Webster – who replaced Chris Chester in March – sit on the subject given Rovers’ current predicament?

“You’d rather be in the top eight for the main thing of recruitment,” was his rather surprise answer, that process being made more difficult given the Qualifiers mean, technically, you could be a Championship club in 2017.

“Other clubs in the top four and five are recruiting for next year and while people here are working really hard behind the scenes on that, it is your main one; you want to get things in place.

“Make no bones about it, the Middle Eights is going to be a slugfest.

“There’s some decent teams in it not like last season when Wakefield were not the greatest, Salford players were leaving and Widnes were nowhere near the team they are this time.

“Rovers probably had a better squad then than all of those in the bottom four. But now, add in that Leeds and Huddersfield are both in there, Leigh are challenging really strongly, London Broncos have come from nowhere as a full-time team, and it’s a far stronger Qualifiers.

“But we’ll worry about that when or if we get to it.

“Us winning Thursday night gives us a chance to get to the top eight and avoid that.

“It’d be a good achievement with the amount of adversity the club’s gone through this year to get in there although it is only a possibility at the moment.

“We still have to win two really hard games and hope things go our way.”

Rovers, of course, know things could have been so different if they had just beaten Hull in their two earlier meetings this year.

Both times they squandered leads – they were 20-0 up after an hour on Good Friday and led in the second half at Magic Weekend – to lose against their fierce rivals who were top of Super League until suffering a surprise loss at home to Leeds last weekend.

Webster admitted: “History shows it’s very important you have to play for the full 80 minutes to beat them.

“They don’t hand you anything. Aside from the Widnes game at the beginning of the year they have been in every single match they have played this year, the majority of which they have won.

“We know we have to play more than well for 80 minutes, but we go there with confidence.

“We understand a win gives us at least two days (when Wakefield play at Catalans) hoping we can get into that top eight.

“This is the first hurdle and it’s a massive hurdle.”

Rovers were down to their last 17 players against Huddersfield but Graeme Horne, James Greenwood, Maurice Blair and James Donaldson are all named in their 19-man squad for the short trip to the KC Stadium and hope to return to action.

Hull, who will have lost three successive games for the first time this year if they do slip up, are without Carlos Tuimavave, who will be replaced by either Leon Pryce or Jordan Abdull.