Cummins pleased as Bradford go Easter unbeaten

Bradford coach Francis Cummins was pleased to survive a second half Salford fightback and make sure the Bulls were one of only three teams to escape the Easter programme unbeaten.

The Bulls followed Thursday’s 18-all draw at Leeds with a hard-fought 36-24 win over the Reds, although they made hard work of the second half, having led 24-6 at the break.

He said: “We went a long time without the ball but that was all credit to Salford who picked themselves up well at half time.

“We defended really well against them but you can’t come out of a bog after defending three sets and try to come up with big plays – you have to play a bit more conservatively, think about field position and get yourselves back in the game.

“You have to earn the right to play and we were perhaps a little bit naive during that spell.

“Eventually we went back to what we were doing in the first half and turned them around, trading set for set, and when we did that we looked really good.”

Tries from John Bateman, Jarrod Sammut, Adrian Purtell and Brett Kearney had the hosts well in command at the break, but scores from Jack Murphy, Chris Nero and Andrew Dixon dragged the gutsy Reds back in to the contest.

Sammut’s calming penalty on 72 minutes was then followed by a decisive second try for the half-back, and means Bradford stay above West Yorkshire rivals Leeds in 6th place.