“We have to toughen up” – Tony Smith reacts to Hull FC’s fourth consecutive defeat

Hull FC lost for the fourth week in a row yesterday.

The Black and Whites started the season impressively with wins over Castleford Tigers and Leeds Rhinos but have done it tough since though injuries haven’t helped.

Yesterday they took on newly promoted Leigh Leopards who also went into the game on two wins but a blistering start from the Leopards had them 16-0 up by the 20 minute mark.

Hull showed some courage and excellence to fight back but lost 24-16.

After the game, Tony Smith was left disappointed and bemoaning his side’s discipline:

“It’s disappointing and there’s a disappointment as well. It took us way too long to build anything there. We’ve got to stop hurting ourselves and allowing the opposition to hurt us before we start to do something about it,” he said on the club’s website as he called for his side to toughen up.

“For us to have to look for a reaction rather than go and be the inflictor of the pain, I mentioned it throughout the week, we need to be the ones on the front foot and those first ten minutes weren’t something that we are proud of. It went on for more than ten minutes but the score blow out in those initial ten minutes.

“When you consider just how average we were in that part of the game, we actually came back and gave ourselves a chance. We’ve got to stop and don’t allow the pain to be inflicted first before we try and scramble our way back in. It wasn’t good enough today, and our discipline was poor today in all sorts of ways.

“I am their coach and I am responsible for it. We have to crack the whip. I have to get tougher. I have to get them tougher. We’ve just got to get tougher as a club, me as a coach, them as players – we’ve got to get tougher.

“We’ve got to make better decisions, get tougher with our defensive efforts, and start to hurt the opposition instead of ourselves. It’s self-inflicted. I’m not excluding myself from the performance. I’m responsible for them each and every week. I’ve got to find the right 17 for each week and make those decisions which I’m happy to do. Sometimes it means I’ve got to change the team, sometimes I have a choice in that and sometimes I don’t.”

Singling out the deficiencies in his side’s performances of late, he added: “Our starts, our discipline, our defence, contact, managing the ruck speed, both ours and theirs (the opponents), all of those things, we’ve got to toughen up.”