Catalan Dragons 34 Wakefield Trinity 10: Wakefield wilt in French heat as Blanch delivers Dragons hat-trick

Trinity slumped to a 34-10 defeat to Catalan Dragons in soaring temperatures on Saturday and Agar admitted their preparations were far from ideal.

He said: “It was tough for us today. We travelled for 12 to 13 hours yesterday to get here and that is not good preparation for us to play here in this heat.

“I don’t want to sound like I’m using that as an excuse because I’m not, but as far as performance goes it is not ideal. The likes of Kyle Trout, Ben Cockayne and Paul Johnson played superbly well for us today, they really stood up in tough conditions and I’m proud of the fact that we kept going and only really faded away in the last 10 minutes due to the conditions.

“If you look at the tries we conceded two were from high kicks at the start of the half and one was an intercept.

“They haven’t really broken our line too often so we can look back on that as a positive.

“We’ve now finished our run of away games at Leeds, Bradford and here so we can go back home and look to build on our promising performances.”

The Dragons’ tries came from Damien Blanch (3), Steve Menzies (2) and Clint Greenshields, Wakefield replying through Ali Lauitiiti and Kyle Trout, Paul Sykes adding a solitary conversion.

Catalans coach Trent Robinson said: “I’ve been impressed by the way that Wakefield have been playing, they’ve played some really good attacking footy.”

Catalan Dragons: Greenshields, Blanch, Duport, Millard, Pala, Pryce, Dureau, Baitieri, Menzies, Paea, Ferriol, Henderson, Casty. Substitutes: Fakir, Pelissier, Raguin, Mounis.

Wakefield Trinity Wildcats: Mathers, Fox, Mellars, Sykes, Cockayne, John, Smith, Washbrook, Kirmond, Lauitiiti, Raleigh, Aiton, Amor. Substitutes: Wood, Wilkes, Johnson, Trout.

Referee: B Thaler (Wakefield).