Kurt Haggerty has provided an early injury update on Will Gardiner, after he was stretchered off the field in tonight’s 40-10 defeat to St Helens.
Gardiner, who started the game on the bench, was involved in a head on head collision with Daniel Suluka-Fifita, and came off second-best.
The ex-Hull FC man went down instantly and looked in some distress before the medical staff quickly attended to him.
After a stoppage, he was helped off the field by both sets of physios and doctors, and was met with a sea of applause from the crowd at Osdal.
The incident took place around 90 seconds from full-time, so there wasn’t much time between that happening and Haggerty’s post-match interview, but there was still a positive update.
“He’s just in the medical room,” the Bulls boss said to Sky Sports. “Will’s just come round a little bit, so he’s just tried to crack a smile the best he can, but it looks pretty severe at the moment. We’ll all be there for Will and hope he’s okay.
With many expecting the game to be ended there and then, both players seemingly agreed that, when the match continued, they would simply see out the tie in respect to Gardiner.
The rugby league community praises itself on it’s togetherness and love for one another, and that was fully on show again this evening.
“What a fantastic sport we are,” Haggerty said. “We’ve got great people in it, and that shows the respect.
“They can go and beat each other up for 79 minutes, and show respect for that last minute, minute and a half. It’s first class. We’ve got a fantastic sport.”
Commenting on the defeat itself, the boss said: “[There were] Green shoots in the first half. A lot of positivity. Completed the round 85-86%.
“[We] showed we could score points but just come out in the second half, conceding far too many penalties.
“There was probably a moment in the game where I felt like we’d gone back 12 months in regards to the rucks, but still think we conceded far too many points and that ultimately lost us the game.”
