Batley Bulldogs going from ‘underdogs’ to ‘favourites’ as Challenge Cup journey starts with Workington Town test

The Bulldogs upset the odds last weekend to superbly win their opening 1895 Cup group game against highly fancied Featherstone Rovers.

But now Moxon’s men will adopt the favourites tag this weekend against their League 1 opponents.

He said: “It will be a different challenge for us. We will be going into the game as favourites I suppose as opposed to going into the Featherstone game as underdogs.

“Fev have still got a lot of quality players. I know they have made a lot of changes to their team this year and they haven’t invested like they have in the past, but I think they have still got 22 real quality players so for us to get a win against that kind of opposition is a great start for us.

“So it will be a different mindset for us on Sunday. We will have a look to see how everybody pulls up and maybe change things around a little bit, I’m not sure just yet. But we will get our prep right and we will be ready to go.”

And Moxon believes the result, and performance, against Rovers - in his first competitive game as head coach since taking over from Craig Lingard - will stand them in good stead going forward.

He said: “The Fev game was a crucial game especially with the change of format to the competition with the three-team leagues. If you lose one of your games then you are under the pump. It was a massive game for us and hopefully we can progress. But we have got to get past Hunslet next.

“But it has given our group a bit of confidence. It is a new group. We have had quite a few players come into the group and if they didn’t know what the Bulldogs spirit was all about before, then they do now.”