Bradford hat-trick hero Shaw will get better, says Lowes

The Bulls, who began the season losing to the Centurions, have since savoured sizeable victories against Whitehaven, Featherstone and now the Hawks, to more than justify their position among the favourites to be challenging for promotion at the end of the summer.

Barely six months ago there was two divisions dividing the teams and the gulf was still more than evident as the full-timers from Odsal put the part-time Hawks to the sword with a 10-try display, supplemented by eight goals from the boot of Shaw.

Jake Mullaney, Lee Gaskell, Adam O’Brien, Shaw twice and Danny Williams touched down for the hosts before the break with Shaw adding five conversions to send the hosts in leading 34-0.

Some fine kicking from Lee and Mullaney allied to a catalogue of errors by the Hawks resulted in hapless Hunslet taking over half an hour to get meaningfully out of their own half.

The Bulls extended their advantage to 40 points when Tom Olbison added another converted try before Hunslet gained small consolation when Luke Briscoe scored just after the hour mark. Further home tries from Shaw – his hat-trick on 66 minutes – and second converted touchdowns from O’Brien and Mullaney completed the scoring.

Bulls coach James Lowes said: “It was a good start but we had to work hard after that. Ryan had moments but I wouldn’t say he had a cracking game.

“There are still things we need to work on with him but the good thing about him is that you tell him something and he works hard to put that into action.”

Bradford Bulls: Shaw; Uaisele, Purtell, Baile, Williams; Gaskell, Mullaney; Clough, O’Brien, Sidlow, Pitts, Walshaw, Mellor. Substitutes: Fleming, Olbison, Ferguson, Tahraoui.

Hunslet: Watson; Duckworth, Keinhorst, Maun, Finigan; Brown, Ansell; Yates, Lee, Mulhern, Delaney, Casey, Houston; Substitutes: Flanagan, Briscoe, Mackay, Brennan.

Referee: C Leatherbarrow (St Helens).