Sheffield Eagles delivered a dominating thumping against Doncaster RFC to seal a Quarter Finals slot in the AB Sundecks 1895 Cup but the coach noted times when the team “got a little sloppy”.
The Eagles opened the scoring, six minutes into the match, thanks to Kris Welham. It was a fairly even contest for most of the first half of the game but Eagles led at the break with a 20-12 scoreline. The game went out of Doncaster’s reach in the second half as the game eventually ended with South Yorkshire rivals losing to Sheffield Eagles by 50-18.
Coach Craig Lingard said after the thumping win against Doncaster that there is still room for improvement. He said: “I think we showed some good signs today. There are still areas where we need to tighten up.”
He highlighted some areas of defensive improvements, stating that the Eagles were a bit sloppy towards the end of the first half. Lingard said the team lost a lot of collisions offensively and defensively once they secured a three-score lead.
The coach had praises to share for the collective performance by the team, but noted the contributions by new signing Corey Johnson and Lewis Peachey. Lingard said that Johnson was not entirely fit to start the game but stepped up to contribute for the match.
Lingard added: “Corey Johnson has been struggling with a little bit of a niggle but he put his hand up to play 80 minutes if we need him.”
Speaking of Lewis Peachey, Lingard said that he “did the job I wanted him to do” which was to make an impact and add more contact in the collisions.
Sheffield Eagles will be facing Bradford in the 1985 cup which will be played at the Bartercard Odsal Stadium on the weekend of 5/6 April.
However, the tie with Bradford is not the current concern for Lingard who must now prepare his team for their upcoming game against Featherstone Rovers in Round 3 of the Betfred Championship on Sunday.
Despite the positives, the coach made it a point to signal out the need to “correct some of the deficiencies” that were on display during the game against Doncaster so that the team can put in a good performance against Featherstone Rovers.
