Craig Lingard admits late venue change was ‘biggest challenge’ for Batley Bulldogs in win over Barrow Raiders

The Championship fixture was moved to the home of their Heavy Woollen neighbours only hours earlier due to “technical issues” at the Fox’s Biscuits Stadium but tries from Josh Hodson, Sami Kibula, James Meadows and Dale Morton gave the Bulldogs a commanding lead before Barrow rallied to score two late consolation efforts.

Speaking to Viaplay Sports after the game, Lingard said:

“The biggest challenge was adapting late. We didn’t find out until dinner time that we were going to be playing here (Dewsbury).

“We had prepared all week to play on our pitch which is considerably wider and considerably longer.

“But we were pretty dominant up to 75 minutes and then we conceded two sloppy tries. The scoreline didn’t reflect how dominant we were through those first 75 minutes, so I am a bit disappointed that we let it slip at the end.

“We needed to learn how to win a gritty game and win a tough game and we’ve done that today.

“We had a decent victory last week in the cup where we didn’t concede any points. I am disappointed we conceded some points today but we’re learning how to win tough games.”

On a cold, wet night in Dewsbury, Lingard was also pleased with the performance of his middles, saying:

“I thought our middles were pretty good today. It is a pretty simple game plan when the weather is like this and the pitch is like this.

“It’s their job in the middle to carry hard and play fast so the outside backs can have a little bit of possession on the front foot. I felt they did that pretty well for us.”

Asked what the mood in the dressing room was like after the game, Lingard responded:

“Really good. Maybe with the couple of defeats we had early on the players were putting too much expectation on themselves - an unrealistic expectation.

“We can have expectations internally in what we want to achieve and what we think we can do but we try to take that expectation away from the players and get them to relax and play the way they want to play.

“I think the last two or three weeks we have done that. We are building slowly but we are not the finished article.

“You don’t win a competition, or get into the play-offs, in the fifth week of the season, so we know it is going to be a long tough year.”