Dewsbury Rams head coach Lee Greenwood has given his reactions after his side was knocked out of the Challenge Cup at the sixth round stage on Friday night losing to Halifax 34-6 at the Tetley’s Stadium.
On the result he said: “I thought the effort from the majority of the lads was there, but there was a difference in quality, it is disappointing viewing. You know that Halifax are going to start big and bully you and that is what happened at the start of both halves.
“There was a number of factors to the defeat, maybe a couple of bounces of the ball went their way as it does with the dominant team. They scored straight away and caught us on the hop, I just think Halifax are what they are, they might be in a false position in the league but they are a fourth or fifth outfit in the league.
“I would like us to stay in games longer and it isn’t good viewing for anyone at the club when you are out of the game and are just trying to keep the score down. You never want to say there is a gulf in quality before the game because then you just go out to lose and we don’t want that, if we had started both halves ten out of ten and gone full tilt then they wouldn’t have scored the tries they did do in the first ten minutes of both halves, then its game on. That is what Halifax do though they start big and try to bully you and they then try to get some attacking sets going. Then they score and then they strangle you, they have been playing that way for years now.
“We have pulled off some good results this season and it is good that I am getting a good look at the players over a longer patch, but there will be defeats along the way like these. I do want us to close that gap on these types of teams, it isn’t easy but the difference in budget compared to some just goes up, I think it will take at least a year to get to something that I am happy with, even then it will be difficult because we just can’t go out and spend like some clubs can. It is a challenge, but it is a good challenge and I like it because there are big games every week, I do like to challenge myself against these teams. However in that I do want us to go further in to games and compete for longer, and lately there are some of the games where we have done this.
“We are going into a patch now where it could be described as a bit more of an equal playing field, I think we play Batley, then Swinton twice and then Rochdale, so there are four games there that are against teams with similar budgets and quality I would say. These are the games for us this season that I think we will see where we are at in my opinion.
“It is a challenging year for the team, for me and for the club this year, it is a transitional year for us but I think there is some ability in that dressing room and I thought for large parts tonight evening against Halifax it was a 50/50 game. It was near the try lines that was the difference in the game.
“I thought Ben Kilner did well, I also thought the guys who came off of the bench got fired in well to be fair, they got stuck in and I thought that was a patch where we competed with Halifax, so fair play to them. Ben came in this weekend, he hadn’t played for a while, but I thought he did well, and carried the ball well, he did what we asked of him.
“You couldn’t knock anyone’s effort really, I was disappointed with the start of both halves because we had spoken about it, but its one thing speaking about it and one thing trying to stop it.”
