Castleford Tigers met Huddersfield Giants in one of four all-Super League ties with the game also serving as captain Paul McShane’s testimonial match.
McShane has been appointed as co-captain by new head coach Craig Lingard alongside fellow veteran Joe Westerman and obviously, McShane skippered the side on his big day.
It marked just the second time that he’d played following his return from injury and also the last game that the Tigers will play before their Super League opener against champions Wigan Warriors.
Castleford’s starting 13 featured four new signings whilst mid-season recruits from 2023 Charbel Tasipale and Liam Horne also started in the pack.
The bench featured a further three new signings including two from down under in Josh Simm and Nixon Putt, as well as ex-Hull KR man Luis Johnson.
As for Huddersfield, who had hammered London Broncos last weekend, they once again went close to full strength with the club able to field Tui Lolohea despite the Tongan having been handed a two-game ban highlighting the disciplinary loopholes once again.
Both new wingers Elliot Wallis and Adam Swift had bagged three each in pre-season so far and so the race was on to see which would top the charts in that was the club’s final pre-season clash.
Castleford Tigers score four second-half tries to defeat Huddersfield Giants
Sam Wood, one of three transfers from Hull KR to Castleford Tigers, scored a brace in the win over Huddersfield Giants. – Photo by Paul Greenwood/Shutterstock 13775745de – PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxHUNxGRExMLTxCYPxROUxBULxUAExKSAxONLY Copyright: xPaulxGreenwood/Shutterstockx 13775745de
The early action saw Huddersfield’s Luke Yates sin-binned for a high shot with the Australian sent for ten minutes on the bench inside the first ten minutes of the match.
Barring some good goal-line defence the sin bin of the Giants’ captain was about as much excitement as there was in the first half with the two teams playing out a 0-0 deadlock.
Perhaps the highlight was Harvey Livett’s try-saving tackle on former Huddersfield man Innes Senior, the game being one for the purist as opposed to the neutral.
The scoring got under way quickly in the second half though with Liam Watts crashing over after just three minutes and like buses, two tries came at once.
Just two minutes after Watts’ score Castleford were in again with former Hull KR winger Sam Wood scoring, Luke Hooley once again adding the extras to make it 12-0.
There was a bigger cause for concern for Huddersfield when Jake Connor took a knock but he continued suggesting it was nothing more than a dead leg.
Huddersfield did get back into the game though with signing Adam Swift getting his fourth in two games, but the prospect of a comeback didn’t last long.
Josh Simm scored just after the hour mark before Sam Wood added his second but Luke Hooley was unsuccessful on both attempts making it 20-4.
Huddersfield pulled one back after earning great territory through an Olly Russell 40/20 and youngster Connor Carr was able to score following some clever George Flanagan Jr skill.
Flanagan missed the conversion leaving the Giants two converted scores down with just five minutes to play, but they could only manage one with former Tiger Elliot Wallis scoring late on to make it 20-14 with the Giants suffering their first defeat of the pre-season.
