POW WOW AT STUNNER
DARYL POWELL hailed depleted Castleford’s brilliant comeback as one of the biggest wins he’s been involved in.
Trailing 12-4 at half-time against a side rested for 10 days, the Super League leaders fought back with a try from Mike McMeeken before Tom Holmes’ 72nd-minute winner.
“When you have a team that never knows when it is beaten, you have a very dangerous side,” said Powell, who rested England aces Luke Gale, Michael Shenton and Zak Hardaker.
“For a team to roll into a game against full-strength opposition that had a significant rest period on us and to come out with that type of performance was awesome.
“We had to dig in at the end and the amount of scramble tackles to keep them out just shows the character we have as well as genuine belief we have something special.
“It was an outstanding effort from a group of blokes who weren’t prepared to come second.”
Saints had beaten Challenge Cup holders Hull and champions Wigan in their first two games under new Aussie coach Justin Holbrook.
But they couldn’t add another big scalp as Tigers’ seventh straight win took them four points clear at the top of the table.
Holbrook said: “We knew it was going to be a tough game and to fall short was disappointing. For us to fall just short is costly from where we are sitting in the table. We tried hard and worked on a few things to improve our game.
“Unfortunately we didn’t do that and that’s what made it disappointing. They weren’t at full strength but they haven’t lost here for a reason.”
Powell’s decision to leave out key men looked to have backfired when tries from Mark Percival and Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook helped Saints into a 12-4 lead.
But the failings that led to Keiron Cunningham’s demise as coach surfaced in a disjointed second half. McMeeken produced some dazzling footwork to bring Tigers back into contention with a converted try.
Sub Jy Hitchcox came up with three try-saving tackles on Regan Grace (twice) and Percival before Holmes completed the recovery.