SIMON TUFFS reckons his York Acorn ARLC side need to play smarter to finally get on the winning trail.

The Blue and Golds lie second bottom of the National Conference League premier division, with last week’s home loss to East Hull being their eighth defeat in ten outings.

Visiting Thanet Road this Saturday are Wigan St Jude’s, who are only two places above them but beat Saddleworth last week.

Said head coach Tuffs: “I’m still confident.

“It’s small things we have to tidy up on. We didn’t do that much different when we had that good win over Skirlaugh, just small things like better ball control and not giving away as many penalties.

“We’re getting close to the top sides but making it difficult for ourselves. Ball control is key. If we do that we make life easier for ourselves.

“The team is good enough. We’re just not playing smart enough.”

Several times this season Acorn have been well in the frame only to lose matches late on. The same happened against East Hull, when two tries in the last six minutes gave the visitors the spoils.

“We’ve got to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves down,” said Tuffs.

“We should have won last week – again – but we didn’t. There’s no point moping about it.

“That said, we probably didn’t deserve to win because we didn’t play well in the first half. We then played okay and changed one or two things around and we got in the lead, but again we let it slip.

“It’s disappointing how many times it’s happened. It must be five or six times where we’ve been in the lead but lost it in the last ten minutes.

“It’s not fitness, it’s a combination of things.

“It’s a mental thing, we’ve had a bit of bad luck and we’ve not helped ourselves at times.”

The three players promoted from the ‘A’ team last week all impressed, with youngster Jimmy Mountford doing enough when coming off the bench to earn the starting berth at hooker this Saturday.

Matt Withers also keeps his place and Josh Mortimer would have done likewise but is unavailable due to work. Simon Wadsworth, another to shine against East Hull, is a doubt due to a back injury.

Tuffs this time last week set his side the target of winning the next four games, but they slipped up at the first hurdle.

He now says it’s even more important to fulfil the rest of that goal.

He added: “It’s another home game and you look to win every game at home whether it’s against a team at the top or the bottom.”

At least one 100 per cent record will end when York Acorn ‘A’ visit fellow unbeaten side Moorends in Yorkshire League division two.