Radford: No point wasting cap on Houghton cover

Hull FC boss Lee Radford admitted not having sufficient cover for Danny Houghton was a risk, but it’s one he feels was worth taking.

The Arlie Birds failed to win any of Houghton’s first three matches out, but victories in their last two games has shown Radford his team can cope with their star man’s absence.

Houghton was named in Hull’s 19-man squad for last Sunday’s home game against Castleford, but Radford decided against throwing him into the battle.

“He just felt a little bit of tightness and it’s one of them,” Radford told the club’s official website.

“I don’t want him to come through four weeks and then set him back another four – I just didn’t want to risk that.

“I think if you look at the wins while Danny’s been out, he’s arguably our most important player. He’s the one player we don’t have sufficient cover for, but we knew that going into the season.

“His past record suggests that he plays an awful lot of rugby during the year, so to bring someone in to play four or five games, to waste that amount of cap, we didn’t see the point.

“Jez (Litten) is probably 12 months away from being a regular first-teamer, so we knew the risk before the season started and if we can get through this period with Danny out and still picking wins up then that’s pleasing.”