Adrian Lam has made three changes to his Leigh Leopards side to take on Batley Bulldogs this afternoon. The Leopards host Batley in the fourth round of the Challenge Cup with a spot in Monday night’s quarter-final draw up for grabs.
Darnell McIntosh comes into the side for his first game of the season after picking up an injury while away on Leigh’s warm weather training camp in pre-season. He steps onto the wing in a change that sees Bailey Hodgson drop out of the starting line-up and onto the bench.
Hodgson has impressed during his spell in the side and McIntosh will be determined to make his mark as he looks to reclaim his spot for next week’s trip to Hull KR in Super League.
Aaron Pene also gets a run out after struggling with injury this season. The forward hasn’t featured since the cup win over Workington Town in February but he’s been deemed fit enough to feature against the Bulldogs.
Ben McNamara also comes into the side for his first outing of the season following Gareth O’Brien’s head knock last week. Jack Hughes and Alec Tuitavake are the other two to miss out at Leigh Sports Village.
Leigh remain unbeaten this season and they’ll fancy their chances of moving to within two wins of another date at Wembley with a win this afternoon against a Championship side who have made an unbeaten start to their league campaign, with a win and a draw coming in their opening two fixtures.
Leigh Leopards: David Armstrong; Darnell McIntosh, Tesi Niu, Umyla Hanley, Keanan Brand; Ben McNamara, Lachlan Lam; Owen Trout, Edwin Ipape, Aaron Pene, Andrew Badrock, Ethan O’Neill, Isaac Liu.
Bench: Louis Brogan, Bailey Hodgson, Matt Davis, Brad Dwyer.
Batley Bulldogs: Robbie Butterworth; Jack Render, Joe Burton, Alfie Dean, Elliot Kear; Ben White, Josh Woods; Brandon Moore, Alistair Leak, Luke Blake; Oliver Greensmith, Kieran Hepworth; Eliot Peposhi.
Bench: Jonah Parsons, Paul Chitakunye, Sam Marshall, Michael Ward.
