Coyle aims to fix Haven’s problems against Rams

Whitehaven coach James Coyle is hoping for an improvement in his team’s performance when they welcome Dewsbury to Cumbria on Saturday.

Haven lost 44-22 at home to Featherstone Rovers last time out, but Coyle saw signs of progression.

“I thought the performance was a big improvement on where we’ve been,” he said.

“There were a few 50/50 calls, which went Featherstone’s way, and we didn’t kick our goals, which was disappointing.

“We’re trying to concentrate on ourselves, we’re not reading too much into what everyone else is doing. Obviously we look at the way they play so we know what to expect, but we look at our own performance and what we do ourselves.

“Our decision-making has been a bit off and our execution on last plays hasn’t been great and we’re making too many errors at crucial times. We can fix that. 

“The way we went about our business on Saturday, if we can keep bringing that each week and improve our systems and our skill by one or two per cent then we’re going to come up with a real good performance, so I’m looking forward to the weekend.”

Dewsbury Rams were beaten 54-4 at home by Super League outfit Wigan in the Challenge Cup last week.

Coach Glenn Morrison felt that his team should have scored more points.

“In the second half we knuckled down and created some opportunities and should have scored tries,” he said.

“We defended a lot of sets in a row against a quality side, so we got a lot of positives out of the second half. And we got through injury-free which was another positive.

“It’s a tough journey up to Whitehaven and you’ve got to be on your game. It’s a major game for both teams in terms of where we finish. We’ll be going up there with the right mentality and hopefully put in the performance.

“We need the two points to get us out of that bottom struggle.”