Crarey: Battling win was good for us

Barrow boss Paul Crarey believes Saturday’s 28-20 home victory against Hunslet was the perfect preparation for the League 1 Super 8s.

The visitors led 18-12 at the break, but the Raiders fought back in the second half to secure the points.

“I’m not really concerned because you’re not going to go through the season and not concede points in modern-day football,” he told the North-West Evening Mail.

“One of those was an interception, which we probably would have scored from if Lewis (Charnock) had squared up, and he just threw the pass when the winger jumped the line.

“We’re not going to stop them playing. People throw intercepts at Super League level and amateur level – it’s just part of the game. You don’t want them to do it, but you don’t want them to stop playing.

“Lewis came up with a play at the back end for the try which won us the game, so he did one thing at one end and made up for it at the other, and that’s the nature of where we’re at.

“We haven’t done any goal-line defence for a few weeks and it shows because we’re not pressing and working for each other.

“We’re not going to over-analyse when it’s fifth place against second, and they’ve got a new coach and bags of enthusiasm. It was a very physical game, so you’re not looking to play, you’re looking to protect yourself and we got the win.

“In the second half, we went route one – which we always do. We got push and play around the ball, we worked on it all week and we got our just rewards for doing it.

“The last play of the game – Lewis to Ryan Fieldhouse – was just outstanding. The pivot goes to the line with bodies around him, which we’d worked on, pushing through the line and a short little pass to score under the sticks, and there was a little bit of pressure on at that time.

“It’s good to get in these grinds because that is what the Super Eights is all about. It was second playing fifth and this is what you’re going to get when you get to the Eights, so we’ve done it tough on the road, come back home and got a win against a top-five side.

“Doncaster is another game where we need to get the win and if we do that, we’ll probably be doing well before we hit the Eights.

“This is another two points in the bag for us, Hunslet have lost, we’ve won and it’s onwards and upwards.”