Just what the doctor ordered ,a good tough game against quality opposition will set the lads up nicely for the campaign ahead .All well and good racking up cricket scores against much weaker opposition, but imo we need to be battle hardened as much as possible and hit the ground running in our first game of the season and give it to Les Cats with both barrels.I’m really hoping that a tough pre-season will stand us in good stead for the rigours to come and we keep in the battle for the full 80 ,if we can I feel we are a match for most and a mid table is achievable as long as Lady Luck shines on us with injuries.

TBH if they give us as good a game as Fax did I'll be delighted. I thought Fax were excellent, every bit as god as Fev looked, so those two combined will be good pre-season work out.

Think the HULL game will be mainly reserves but who knows.

Indeed, it probably didn't look good to some ie the giant ex-NRL player targeting the tiny young full back but it was his Samoan countryman Phoenix Laulu-Togogae and I think Joey's good friends with both him and his dad Quentin (QLT), they were having a good laugh about it together after the final whistle.

Joey looked some way off full fitness btw, think it's probably his sore calf that's responsible as he barely did more than jog when he made that interception, so we'll have to see if he plays or not on Sunday.

Actually we can be sure now Joey won't be playing, sadly his mother died over the weekend so he's returning to Australia for a short period.

Very sad news for him indeed.

I am looking forward to the game should be good for both clubs and I expect fairly strong team selection from both, injuries and niggles permitting of course.

Slight tangent I know but I've just read this weeks League Express and it would appear that Les Cats have a bit of an injury crisis of their own...Fouad Yaha has had shoulder surgery and is out for 5 months, McMeeken is out with a broken wrist, Tyrone May is recovering from a dislocated hip and Tomkins is recovering from a knee operation. Plus, I believe Pearce is still banned and not eligible to play against us ??

The downside of your post is that although Tompkins is recovering from injury, I have it on good authority it will not stop him refereeing the game unfortunately

Tomkins is a massive loss for them, they are a completely different side with him on the field IMO, although they have an exciting replacement in Morgue, they miss Tomkins influence on the team when he`s not playing.

I`m hoping that we can catch them cold and come away with 2 points.

Plus I read they did not start any pre season training till after the new year. But even with all those points in our favour we still need to be on top of our game.

The bookies are giving us 4 start and all in all , I think that's good , so I have had a few quid on us already.

Has the game sold out yet? Got my ticket yesterday

Does anyone know if Tanginoa is injured? Not featured in any of the pre season games so far. Also, interesting to see Proctor will be starting prop.

Tanganoa has an injury that he said would keep him out 2/3 weeks.
He did a small interview 2 weeks ago before the Fax game ..
So I didn’t expect him to be in the lineup for this weekend.