Catalans Dragons 10 Hull FC 38: Radford full of praise after Hull romp home

Fetuli Talanoa put the Catalans Dragons to the sword as he scored two tries and created another.

Radford said: “I’m really pleased. Individually, I thought the team were top drawer, collectively I thought we were really tough.

“I said before the game that I thought that was the strongest bench I’ve ever had at my disposal and I thought it showed when I made the interchanges that we didn’t lose any momentum and managed to maintain the level of physicality we’d started with.”

Both sides traded early tries as Talanoa opened the scoring for Hull before Pat Richards added the first of his two scores for the home side.

Sika Manu edged Hull FC further in front with a try created by Mark Minichiello, Marc Sneyd added the conversion.

Richards again levelled, after two superb wide passes by Todd Carney and Richie Myler created space for the former Wigan winger to score in the corner. Richards converted to make it 10-10.

That was as good as it got for the home side as Josh Bowden powered over from 10 metres out and Jack Logan pounced on an error by Olivier Elima to score before the interval. Marc Sneyd converted both efforts to give Hull a 22-10 lead.

It was one-way traffic after half-time with the visitors running in a further three tries – via Gareth Ellis, Talanoa and Jamie Shaul – and having two ruled out by the video referee, all despite having former Dragon Leon Pryce sent to the sin-bin for 10 minutes.

Catalans Dragons: Gigot, Yaha, Inu, Duport, Richards, Carney, Myler, Anderson, Pelissier, Bousquet, Stewart, Horo, Baitieri. Substitutes: Taylor, Mounis, Bosc, Elima.

Hull: Shaul, Michaels, Logan, Tuimavave, Talanoa, Pryce, Sneyd, Taylor, Houghton, Watts, Minichiello, Manu, Thompson. Substitutes: Pritchard, Ellis, Bowden, Washbrook.

Referee: R Hicks (RFL).