YORK Knights head coach Andrew Henderson lauded his side’s Betfred Challenge Cup performance yesterday afternoon as “incredible”.

York defended resolutely to triumph over Betfred Championship high-fliers Sheffield Eagles 24-22 at the LNER Community Stadium to set up a Fifth Round tie at home to Newcastle Thunder later this month.

While the task would have been tough with 13 men, the Knights stepped up to deliver perhaps their best performance of the season, despite Danny Kirmond’s controversial dismissal as the first half drew to a close.

And Henderson was rightly delighted with the grit and determination shown by his side to claim victory, enthusing:

“What an incredible performance from the York Knights!”

“Those who obviously weren’t at the game probably won’t understand what we had to do today to get that result.

“We effectively played with 12 men for 55 minutes. Danny Kirmond was sent off around the 25 minute mark of the first half, which obviously put us under a huge amount of pressure.

“So for the players to absorb that and manage that and come through with the result the way they have is nothing short of an incredible performance. I’m so proud of them.

“Let’s not forget [Sheffield] are sitting third in the Championship and have been in great form of recent weeks.

“I said to them, if they don’t believe in the process now of what we what we try and set out to do each week, I don’t know when they will because that’s what they did today.

“I thought we really came out the blocks. We showed some real intensity and purpose and what what we’re doing in terms of our actions, defensively it was like a different team that we’ve seen in the last two weeks.

"We've made them come up with errors and what I liked most about it was when we're able to execute the game plan that we've, we've practised in training and we were able to take advantage of that.

"I thought some of the skill and the smarts around that game plan that we executed were excellent.

"I'm so elated. I'm so proud of the team today and and really pleased for them because I think we needed a performance.

"That's all I was focused on this week was just getting a good performance, and getting back to what we do best."