It was a big score-line at St Helens in the Challenge Cup on Friday but we have learned a lot from the experience.

We spoke before about St Helens being a quality side and they showed that as they exposed some areas of our defence which don't get highlighted as much in National League level.

They really challenged us around the ruck area by changing the lines and point of attack and the support play.

That's what you are up against in Super League and the experience for the ones that played will be invaluable.

A lot of our lads stood up to the challenge. Peter Fox didn't look out of place and he's shown that going from Leeds to York as part of his development instead of playing under-21 football has really worked.

He made two or three try-saving tackles, ran the ball forward and secured a couple of challenging kicks.

Ian Kirke worked hard as did Darren Callaghan, and Jimmy Elston played in a few different positions and he got the man of the match award from one publication.

They all worked hard in there. It was good to see how they handled it. We struggled a bit defensively and we struggled at the start because of the speed of the game.

But they will all gain from the experience and for the ones hoping to push up to that level, it's given them a good insight into what questions are asked at that level.

The Toulouse versus Widnes quarter-final will be shown live on BBC, which is the first time the BBC are going to France for a rugby league game.

I actually played in the first Super League game at Paris St Germain back in 1996. I was playing for Sheffield and we got beat in front of the Sky cameras, so they have been there before, but this is a first for the BBC.

It's great for the French teams. They have done well in this year's cup and now Toulouse have been rewarded with a televised game.

One of the ex-Leeds players plays for Toulouse now and he will be pleased that all his mates can watch him back home.

They are working hard to develop rugby league in France. Obviously, the Paris team didn't go quite as well as expected and they dropped out of the Super League programme. But they have got a lot going on there now with Perpignan joining Super League next season and Toulouse doing well in the Challenge Cup.

They are recruiting well from Australia, New Zealand and Tonga and it will be good to have a look at one of the top French sides on a national basis.

You have got to earn the right to get the media coverage and if we had scored 20-odd points against Saints we might have got more, but the scoreline suggested it was a one-way battle. The more coverage you get, it's great for the club but unfortunately we got nilled so I can't complain.

They got five tries from five consecutive sets at one point on the second half but I thought that we competed quite well for long periods and we asked a few questions of them.

I was disappointed that we didn't score but it's a different speed of play and our players don't play at that pace on a weekly basis.

I think we got what we deserved in that we worked hard, never gave in and showed a real never-say-die attitude.

I don't think the result will put a dint in what we are trying to achieve this year but we need to get our performance back on track.

Updated: 11:34 Wednesday, May 11, 2005