Senior double just the tonic for Tigers

Batley 14 Castleford 28

RELIEVED Craig Lingard survived a Challenge Cup scare to get his first win as Castleford boss but some players were left shaking their heads.

The Tigers struggled at times going up Batley’s famous sloping pitch into a fierce wind.

Lingard is a legend at Batley having scored 142 tries in 205 games for them and leading them to Wembley last year before taking on the Castleford gig.

He said: “I was really disappointed with some aspects. It’s good to get that first win, though, and to get out of that losing habit.

“We’ll take that into Leeds on Thursday.”

Luke Manning cut a brilliant line to charge over for Batley in the ninth minute and things got worse for the visitors when their short drop-out failed to go 10 metres.

Dave Gibbons slotted the penalty to add to his earlier conversion for an 8-0 lead.

But Cas scored back-to-back tries via Josh Simm and Rowan Milnes, Paul Mcshane converting to put them 10-8 ahead in the 25th minute.

Batley hit straight back, though, when Brandon Moore burrowed through some atrocious goalline defence to score on his 200th career appearance.

However, giant prop Albert Vete made a huge contribution off the bench to get Tigers moving again, ending with

Innes Senior’s first score.

Co-captain Mcshane (left) forced his way over in the 43rd minute and added the conversion.

Castleford added to their lead when Jacob Miller smuggled over.

They lost ex-batley full-back Luke Hooley to a suspected dislocated shoulder but Senior claimed his second try in the 71st minute to make sure of the win.

Bulldogs boss Mark Moxon said: “The effort was fantastic.

“We could have taken some of those chances in the second half, but overall it was a massive effort from the lads.”