Castleford Tigers fell to a huge 40-4 defeat to St Helens but head coach Craig Lingard has highlighted an ‘ultimate positive’ to take away.
Earlier in the season, Castleford Tigers had won at The Totally Wicked Stadium in one of their season-best performances but with just 20 players available to Craig Lingard, his side struggled against a resurgent St Helens.
The Red Vee saw the likes of Daryl Clark, Lewis Dodd and Mark Percival all return whilst Cas saw full-back Tex Hoy drop out as Lingard named several teenagers.
Speaking to BBC West Yorkshire radio after the game, the Tigers boss explained what a huge task his side had faced.
Lingard stated: “It was a tough game, difficult game, we knew it was going to be tough. Saints were back pretty much full strength and we had a lot of bodies out and a lot of young kids in there.
Castleford Tigers boss ‘proud’ in defeat
Credit: Paul Currie/SWpix.com
St Helens might have ran in eight tries but Lingard was eager to highlight his pride in defeat, particularly regarding three teenagers who all played including debutant Akim Matvejev.
“I’m immensely proud of the team and the three 18-year-old kids that we have. That’s the ultimate positive we can take out today, that we’ve got three young kids that are doing really well in their development, and they’ve gone out there and played together today, and they ended up on the field at the same time in the last five or six minutes of that game, which was immensely pleasing for us as a club.”
Specifically on debutant Matvejev, the first Estonian to play in Super League, Lingard explained:”I think it was 18 months ago that we were playing in the community game, and he’s been a late bloomer in Rugby League, or a late starter, and the development that he’s shown in such a short space of time for him to make his first team debut today has been unbelievable.”
Fellow 18-year-olds Jenson Windley and Fletcher Rooney also got nods.
Credit: Matt West/SWpix.com
On Windley, Lingard said: “Jenson Windley who is a halfback, jumped on in the middle at nine and defended in the middle at nine. He’s real disappointed in himself for that last try that he got run over on that last try. I’ll have to have a bit of a chat with him. He’s got to be mentally proud of what he’s done over the last few weeks and remember where he is and where he’s come from.
“It’s three weeks after his 18th birthday and what he’s doing at this moment in time as a very young 18-year-old kid and standing up against the sort of quality of players that he’s standing up against. He’s doing really well.
“Obviously, Fletch has been waiting for that opportunity at full-back with Tex being out today and he took his try really well. So there are some really positive signs with these young kids but we’ve got to make sure that we’ll learn these lessons into next year now and we can develop these young kids more to get some better quality around them as well.”
It will have overjoyed Lingard to hand out debut shirts and blood in teenagers over the back end of the season but it has also been a necessity as the Castleford Tigers boss revealed the major injury issues his side are facing, including veteran Liam Watts.
“We’re down to our last 20 bodies today. We’ll assess some of the injuries that we’ve got, whether Tex is back fit or not, and some of the other ones that have missed out this week for the injury.
“Wattsy was struggling a little bit with his hamstring but he went back on and did another stint for us so we’ll assess how he is.”
