Tom Opacic and Elijah Taylor focus: Mixed fortunes for Hull KR and Featherstone Rovers stars in friendly

Former Parramatta Eels centre Tom Opacic made his non-competitive debut for the Robins, while Featherstone supporters got their first look at ex-Salford Red Devils captain Elijah Taylor.

It was a winning start for Taylor as the home side overpowered their Super League visitors in Craig Hall's testimonial game.

After Craig Kopczak and Gareth Gale crossed in the first half, Luke Briscoe helped himself to a double and Chris Hankinson completed the scoring to give Featherstone an impressive 28-0 victory.

Here, The Yorkshire Post takes a look at how Opacic and Taylor fared.

Tom Opacic

On a freezing cold night at the home of a physical Championship outfit, it was a tough initiation for the Australian and a far cry from his last outing, a 40-4 victory over Canberra Raiders in the NRL semi-finals.

Opacic's display could best be described as rusty in a scratchy overall performance from the Robins.

The 28-year-old started with plenty of energy, getting a nice offload away with one of his first touches.

But errors crept into his game as the first half went on, with and without the ball.

Opacic knocked on a poor pass from Rowan Milnes and was then guilty of a missed tackle on Hankinson which almost led to a try.

The only time he was put into space, Opacic was crowded out and saw his blind pass picked up by a Featherstone man.

After forcing Gale into an error from Jordan Abdull's steepling kick, Opacic appeared destined to score close to the line only to be dragged down just short.

Regarded as a strong defender, he would have been disappointed with his failure to prevent Hankinson getting the ball away for Gale's try.

Opacic was withdrawn 10 minutes into the second half with a useful hit-out under his belt.

Later in the season, Opacic may well look back on a testing night at Featherstone as a good grounding experience.

Elijah Taylor

There was some surprise when Taylor was forced to drop down to the Championship in the absence of a Super League offer.

The loose forward proved his quality in his first outing for Featherstone, leading their line speed from the start and marshalling his team-mates throughout his time on the field.

Taylor set the tone with an early hit on Louis Senior which forced an error and followed it up with a nice flat pass to put Kopczak over after engaging Hull KR's defensive line.

The former New Zealand international had good variety to his play, carting the ball up one set and tipping the ball on the next.

Taylor came off after half an hour before returning for the final 20 minutes.

It was no coincidence that Featherstone looked more dangerous in the final quarter with the energetic and vocal Taylor back out on the field.

His performance underlined the sense that Rovers have pulled off one of the coups of the season.