Salford’s fightback is too little, too late
A STIRRING fightback was not enough for Salford as they slipped to a 24-20 defeat at Castleford.
The Tigers were on course for a comfortable victory after Greg Eden added to first-half tries from Nathan Massey and Jordan Rankin to give them an 18-4 lead.
But Salford – fresh from a stunning 46-0 demolition of Catalans Dragons – produced a superb comeback as Jansin Turgut and Joey Lussick scored in quick succession.
Jesse Sene-Lefao’s try gave the Tigers a cushion, only for Jake Bibby to go over for his second try to set up a nervy finish.
Salford had earlier sensed an opportunity when Paul McShane was sin-binned after he and Peter Mata’utia took exception to a tackle by Red Devils debutant Adam Walker, making his first appearance after serving a drugs ban.
Bibby set up a nervy final five minutes when he punished a Minikin mistake but Lussick’s two missed conversions proved the difference in a close encounter.
The Tigers are a tough team to beat in front of their own fans and they showed why as they closed out a gritty win.
“We’ve just spoken in there and we’re really disappointed we’ve let an opportunity slip,” said Salford head coach Ian Watson.
“We feel we’ve let it slip by our own little errors. “But I think we’re good enough to compete with these teams now. We just have to believe that ourselves and have the belief going forward. We need to show that next week against Wigan. “We’ve had a great month – a tough game against St Helens, a game against Catalans away and a tough game at Castleford.
“We need to come back to the AJ Bell next week and show what we’ve learnt in these last three games.”
Tigers coach Daryl Powell warned they will need to improve for next week’s mouth-watering clash with St Helens.
Powell’s side welcome the tabletopping Saints to the Mend-A-Hose Jungle on Friday in one of the biggest games of the campaign so far.
While Powell is confident his men will rise to the challenge, he knows they cannot afford a repeat of yesterday’s performance. “Mentally we’ve got a quick turnaround this week against the best team in the competition on Friday so we’ll be moving on pretty quickly,” he said.
We’ve just spoken in there and we’re really disappointed we’ve let an opportunity slip Ian Watson, Salford coach