Willie Peters warns Hull KR players axe could fall if they lose focus at Wakefield Trinity
The Robins have already secured a play-off place and a date with Leigh Leopards but fourth place and home advantage is up for grabs tonight in the final round.
To take next week’s eliminator clash to Craven Park, the Robins must better Leigh's result against Wigan Warriors and overturn a 34-point deficit on for and against.
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Hide AdPeters has made it clear to his team that they cannot afford to go away from what has worked for them during a four-match winning run in the pursuit of points.
"We've got a very, very competitive squad with the amount of players we've got to choose from, so they're playing for positions," said Peters, who has only Sam Wood and Jimmy Keinhorst on the casualty list.
"We're going there on Friday to put in a good performance so we can build for the finals.
"This time of the year is all about momentum. We've certainly got a bit at the moment – and we need to keep that.
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Hide Ad"What individuals can control is their job and how they prepare for the game. We're massive on being consistent with our preparation.
"If we want to sway away from that then it's going to hurt certain individuals when we've got to select a team the week after. There's a whole lot to play for on Friday.
"We could go to Wakefield and try chase points to be a top-four team and come up with errors. We'll get beaten on the scoreboard if that happens, no doubt.
"We need to have the discipline to go over there and play with a Hull KR style."
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Hide AdAs the night progresses, the scoreline at Leigh will give Rovers an idea of the margin of victory required to leapfrog their rivals, if indeed the Leopards are behind against League Leaders' Shield frontrunners Wigan.
Peters, however, will not be keeping an eye on events at Leigh Sports Village.
"Definitely not," he stressed. "We'll be ignoring it.
"This is our next job. It's really, really important that we focus on Friday.
"It's an opportunity to play back at home. Mathematically we can still achieve that – and there's no doubt we want to achieve that.
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Hide Ad"Again, Friday is the most important game because if we don't focus on beating Wakefield, we're going away to Leigh, which we'll worry about after.
"We certainly would love to play in front of our home fans again. It's an important game for us to show how far we've come in terms of maturity and discipline. We'll see where that's at on Friday."
The Robins face a team fresh from a crushing golden-point defeat at Leigh that signalled the end of their time in Super League.
Rovers are expected to win convincingly at Belle Vue but it has not always been a happy hunting ground for the club, with the win in March their first since 2019.
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Hide AdPeters is expecting nothing less than a challenging encounter.
"Wakefield will throw a lot at us and there's no doubt they'll want to finish on a high," he said.
"Mash (Mark Applegarth) has done a great job even though they're going down. He's had it hard this year in terms of resources and the amount of staff he's had there but he's done the best he could and will get them up again this week, there's no doubt about that.
"We've had some issues playing Wakefield away. We spoke about it in Tenerife (in pre-season) and it was something we wanted to move on from and grow as a team.
"We've achieved that once this year and have an opportunity to do it again. That'll tell us how far we've come."
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