Kingstone Press Championship Preview: Batley Bulldogs v Doncaster

Batley Bulldogs may have been beaten by Bradford Bulls last week but coach John Kear could take away some positives.

“I was really pleased performance-wise but again we’ve come away with nothing results-wise but that might be indicative of the standard of opposition that we played,” he said.

“We were in the game right down to when we were down to 12 men. There’s plenty of positives to take from it but also lessons to be learned as well.

“At some stage Doncaster are going to win a game and we’ve got to try and make sure it’s not when they play us. There’s the fear factor that at some stage they’ll get there.

“The challenge for our players is being as good when they play teams in and around us as when they’re playing the bigger teams.”

Gary Thornton, the Doncaster coach, was disappointed with the way his team started the game against Whitehaven.

“We were very lethargic and came up with a lot of silly errors and got what we deserved,” he said. “In the second half we gave it a dig, but we’ve never really put in an 80-minute performance.

“I saw Batley against Bradford. It was a scrappy game and there were a lot of errors but I thought Batley came out with a bit of credit.

“Mount Pleasant isn’t an easy place to go, so it’s not going to be easy. We’re pretty low on confidence but we’ve just got to go there and give it a shot.”

Scrum-half Richard Wilkinson has a knee problem and Danny Cowling is struggling with a dead leg but loose forward Brad Foster could return.