Hornets face unprecedented injury crisis

Rochdale Hornets coach John Stankevitch has fitness checks to run on 10 players before finalising his squad to face the Lions.

And with five other players already ruled out for the season, Stankevitch has described it as “the worst injury situation we’ve been in this year”.

He added: “We’ve got a 25 man squad, so we’ve only got 10 players who are fully fit at the moment.

“However, I’m confident we can have a strong team on the field on Sunday. We’ve got 10 ex-Swinton players in our squad, so they certainly won’t need any motivation for this game.”

Stankevitch continued: “The way we play at home gives us massive confidence. We’ve got the best home record in the division this season. We’ve got nothing to fear when we’re at home.”

Lee Wingfield returns for Swinton Lions after missing last week’s defeat against York due to family commitments.

Lions coach Paul Kidd said: “We took quite a few positives from ball in hand and our enthusiasm, but we need to look at our defence. We let York in for some soft tries.”