YORK City Knights player-coach Paul Broadbent lauded the battling qualities in his side after they won 33-14 at Workington Town yesterday.

It was the Knights' fourth win on the trot and sees them move to fifth place in the National League Division Two table, while the gap at the top closed as leaders Keighley Cougars lost 33-6 to Sheffield.

Broadbent admitted the match at Derwent Park was not the prettiest but said it was a victory for hard work.

"We grafted it out, we really had to work hard for it," the former Great Britain prop told the Evening Press.

"We didn't expect it to be any different up here. They kept coming at us and the game was not sewn up until just before the end.

"I thought there were a few areas of our game that were not as sharp as we would like but we got something out of what we did do well."

He added: "There were one or two contentious decisions (by referee Mike Dawber) but that's by the by. It became a bit of a slog as the game was allowed to be bogged down."

The Knights' next home match against leaders Keighley in a fortnight's time now promises to be a real cracker, but Broadbent said they were focusing only on the next game, away to Chorley Lynx next Sunday.

"Keighley will be a big challenge but I don't look any further than next week," he said. "I've said before I'm pretty conscious about trying to keep the players working hard and getting week-to-week results. The first time we start slacking off or losing our focus is when we will come unstuck."

Broadbent also praised half-backs Scott Rhodes and Danny Brough for the part they've played in the Knights' four consecutive victories.

"They're playing some decent stuff at the moment," he said. "They're getting a little bit more space because of the fact we've got some guys running well off them on the outside. Generally we're looking reasonably alright at the moment."

Up to 100 fans from York made the long trek to Workington to up the Derwent Park attendance to 539 and again they were not slow to make their voices heard.

The victory, though, could be marred by an injury to Chris Smith. The full-back seemed to jar his knee in the last minute when diving to deny Town winger Graeme Lewthwaite a try in the corner from a kick over the top.

Smith hobbled off and his knee was heavily bandaged after the game, though he told the Press they would not know what the damage was until the swelling had gone down.

The in-form Brough has been called in to the National League Under-21s squad.

The talented scrum-half is now in line to face the Super League U21s as a curtain-raiser to the Origin matches at Bradford's Odsal Stadium on Wednesday, July 2.

Updated: 11:25 Monday, June 23, 2003