Kingstone Press League 1 Preview: Barrow Raiders v University of Gloucestershire All Golds

Paul Crarey, the Barrow Raiders coach, was pleased with his side’s 38-10 victory at Hemel Stags.

“We prepared well and we started well which we didn’t do against Keighley,” he said.

“We were error-free for about 10 sets and played really well. We were happy to come away with the win because they were coming into some form and brought some dual-registration players in the  from Hunslet.

“We wanted to go down there and have a clinical performance.

“We really struggled against Gloucester the last time we played them. They had a great kicking game but we’ve improved since then.

“Looking at their results, they’re a little bit up and down. We’ll prepare for the good Gloucester that might turn up. We’ve got to make sure we’re not inconsistent and prepare like we did last week against Hemel and not get complacent.

“We have a saying, ‘complacency is the enemy of winners’ so we’ll prepare as best we can. We’ve done really well at home, apart from against Keighley when we let ourselves down in the first half, so we want to put that right for the home fans.”

The University of Gloucestershire All Golds coach Lee Greenwood was struggling to take any positives out of their 38-6 defeat at Newcastle Thunder.

“I don’t think they had to do anything good to beat us,” he said. “Any time they got near our half they looked like scoring.

“It doesn’t get much easier this week. I don’t expect any favours from Barrow, we’re expected to get beaten heavily so we go there with no expectations whatsoever.

“It’s a struggle at the moment, it just reiterates how massive recruitment is before the season starts.

“If you don’t get that right then you’re struggling and I think you’ve seen that with other southern teams as well. If you don’t recruit the numbers and the right numbers you leave yourself with problems.

“It’s something we need to learn from quickly for next season but for this season we’re still trying to bring players in just to make us as competitive but it is really difficult.”