York Knights boss admits lessons to be learned from Bulls defeat

A dreadful first half proved the Knights’ undoing, and with a number of players out of position, they found their defence lacking, and were lucky to only go in with an 18-10 deficit at half time.

The play-off chasing Bulls soon extended their lead before a Sam Cook-inspired fightback brought the scores back within two with 10 minutes remaining, but Zac Fulton’s late try ensured the points remained in West Yorkshire.

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York’s first half endeavours were not helped by stand-in full-back Nikau Williams’ sin bin eight minutes before the break, and with a penalty count 7-1 in the hosts’ favour, Applegarth admits his side lacked both discipline and game smarts during a costly opening 40 minutes.

“It was pretty disappointing that first half from us, if I’m honest,” he conceded.

“I thought we were sloppy in terms of how many penalties we gave away, I thought there were a few too many of us that dipped our toe in a bit.

“It’s a weird feeling in that dressing room because you’re not questioning people’s effort and how we got ourselves back into the game, it’s more the smartness for allowing a team to get those scores on us like they did.

“But you’ve got to say credit to Bradford Bulls, because they got the win in the end and we’ll have to learn some lessons and dust ourselves off.

“We’re not really questioning anyone’s effort, it’s more the smartness and how we applied ourselves today.

“There were some really outstanding efforts, but ultimately, we’ve left ourselves a bit too much to do and I just thought if we’d have played how we did in that second half - our completion was 100 per cent, 14 out of 14 – and been a bit more clinical with our discipline, we’d have probably given ourselves an easier game.

“There’s a lot of lessons we can learn from that, and we’ll make sure we learn them quick with the play-offs coming around quickly.”

The Knights' defence was all at sea for large parts of the first half, with the Bulls finding it all too easy to carve them open. (Image: Craig Hawkhead Photography)

Half-back Jordan Lilley ran the show for the Bulls, but the Knights did not heed the warning of his testing grubber inside the opening minute, with their defence all at sea as Max Lehmann twisted and turned his way into the right corner with four minutes on the clock.

And it was all Bradford until back-to-back errors within 20 metres of their line allowed Brad Ward and the impressive Connor Bailey to fire York into an unlikely lead by the quarter-hour.

Jayden Myers levelled the scores before Kieran Gill twice found the whitewash amid some shaky edge defence – his second just a minute after Williams’ sin bin for a rash high tackle.

John Davies added his name to the scoresheet within four minutes of the restart before Eribe Doro powered across from close range.

But it was not until they were 30-10 behind that the Knights found any fluency in the second half.

Interchange prop Ronan Michael broke through the defensive line before unselfishly playing in Cook to score what had seemed to be a consolation with 15 minutes remaining, but the half-back had another in the blink of an eye after dummying from James Cunningham’s pass.

Nerves were then sent jangling when Williams raced away through a non-existent Bradford defence before setting up Jimmy Keinhorst, who produced a diving finish into the left corner, with Jack Potter’s conversion bringing the scores back within two with just six minutes remaining.

Fulton though ensured a deserved victory was Bradford’s at the death.

Applegarth was disappointed by the manner in which his side were carved open with ease during the first half, believing the tries they had given away were soft.

The head coach explained: “I thought they were soft tries. A lack of urgency is probably the word. We’ve learned a tough lesson from it.

“Definitely those first three were soft tries, but they all count, don’t they. It’s a lesson that we’ve got to pick up ourselves, that you can’t afford to be gifting teams as good as these tries like that and expect not to be up against it.

“We won’t use that as an excuse for why we lost, it’s more the fact that we need to learn how to play a bit smarter and a little bit more disciplined in how we go about our business.”