Kingstone Press League 1 Preview: Hemel Stags v South Wales Scorpions

Hemel Stags go into the game on the back of a 31-28 defeat at Oxford.

Coach Troy Perkins: said: “It was very frustrating last week. We set ourselves a couple of goals and we achieved those goals, however, the amount of ball we spilled and the unforced errors we made is unacceptable.

“To be honest we beat ourselves; we turned over too much ball in our own half and put ourselves under massive amounts of pressure. We need to be better than that or we won’t beat anyone.

“We’re back at home this week against South Wales. We’ve been away for the last couple of weeks and it’s a good opportunity to get back on track but South Wales could be a bit of a banana skin for a lot of teams. By all accounts they are a tight-knit group and they’ll be looking to put things right after being beaten quite heavily last week up at Barrow.”

South Wales Scorpions were beaten 86-0 at Barrow Raiders last week. Coach Mike Grady said: “It was one of those days. Barrow were on fire but we did everything wrong. We had one last year against York so we’ve been there before, we’ve just got to get out of it.

“Hemel will be smarting from their defeat to Oxford and looking to get a victory. I don’t think I’ve ever won at Hemel, it’s a tough place to go.”

New signings Jonny Leather and Micah Manuokafoa are both injured while Ryan Millington is unavailable. Centre Brad Hill is a doubt but forward Neil Dallimore should be back.