Lee Radford feeling upbeat as returning players putting Castleford Tigers into Challenge Cup quarter finals

Castleford Tigers had won only once in six games this season, before their Challenge Cup sixth-round derby at Leeds Rhinos.

Attack hadn’t been a problem, but Castleford were conceding too many points and looked vulnerable in the middle of the field.

Against Leeds, Adam Milner came in for his first appearance of 2022, following a back problem; Nathan Massey returned from the hip injury he suffered in the opening game of the campaign and fellow forward Liam Watts was also restored to the side.

In addition, full-back Niall Evalds made his comeback – allowing Gareth O’Brien to move into the halves and Paul McShane revert to hooker – and centre Jake Mamo came in at centre.

That was five first-choice players back in coach Lee Radford’s 17 and their presence had the desired effect; Castleford were superior to Leeds in every department and a much-improved defensive display, combined with a continuation of their free-scoring attacking form, paved the way for a comfortable and highly-impressive 40-16 win.

The visitors had the job done by half-time when they led 28-0 and though Leeds staged a mini-revival in the second period, the 24-point margin was a fair reflection of Castleford’s superiority.

Radford felt line speed and ruck control was at the heart of Castleford’s dominant performance and stressed: “Having some blokes in there who are better at it helps. I think there’s a reason you pay somebody £25,000 a year and a reason you pay somebody £150,000. The more one to 17s you can keep on the field, the better chance you’ll give yourself throughout the year.”

Radford, who joked he had never got out of the £25,000 pay bracket as a player, added: “I’ve been saying for a while our performances have looked better the last few weeks and once we get some troops back on the field we can start to look up.

“This has probably reinforced what I was thinking.”

Leeds, on the other hand, showed no sign of reversing the poor form which led to their coach Richard Agar stepping down a week ago. In Jamie Jones-Buchanan’s first game as interim-coach, they looked dispirited and low on confidence. They did have a brief good spell at the start of the second period, but had conceded five tries by that stage.

Poor discipline and lack of intent in defence was exposed when Castleford added 18 points in 11 minutes before the interval to effectively make the game safe.

Castleford scored twice while Leeds were down to 12 men, with Brad Dwyer in the sin-bin for tripping Kenny Edwards. An inability to keep 13 players on the field has been one of Rhinos’ major failings this year. Tries by Rhyse Martin and Liam Sutcliffe gave them the faintest glimmer of hope in the opening 10 minutes of the second half, with scrum-half Aidan Sezer involved in both.

He then threw out a pass which Greg Eden intercepted to take the wind out of Leeds’s sails, the sort of costly error which has dogged Rhinos all year.

Eden is in outstanding form and also scored Castleford’s final try, after Martin, who kicked two conversions, had crossed again for the hosts. In the first half, Jake Trueman, Mamo, O’Brien, Jordan Turner and George Lawler all exploited Leeds’ defensive frailties. O’Brien converted all but the first of Castleford’s tries.

Summarising his side’s performance, Radford said: “What is absolutely key for us is our D [defence]. We signed a lot of attacking players in the off-season, but we have got to focus on our D. If we get our D right, there’s points in this team.”

Leeds Rhinos: Walker, Tindall, Briscoe, Sutcliffe, Handley, Austin, Sezer, Oledzki, Leeming, Prior, Bentley, Martin, O’Connor. Substitutes: Dwyer, C Smith, Gannon, Donaldson

Castleford Tigers: Evalds, Eden, Turner, Mamo, Faraimo, Trueman, O’Brien, D Smith, McShane, Griffin, Edwards, Lawler, Westerman. Substitutes: Watts, Milner, Massey, Fonua.

Referee: Liam Moore (Wigan).