Paul Rowley has said he likes his side ‘to entertain’ the crowd, as the Salford Red Devils secured a fantastic 30-14 victory over Castleford Tigers in Round 13 of the Betfred Super League last Friday.
After a crucial win against Leeds Rhinos the week prior, the Red Devils were looking to earn back-to-back victories for the second time this season. Despite Ryan Hampshire giving the visitors an early lead, Tim Lafai’s try and a quick Joe Burgess brace before the interval gave Salford a healthy advantage going into the second 40.
The Red Devils were lethal on the break, and Deon Cross scored a crucial try on the hour mark after a neat line-break from Andy Ackers. Castleford went down to 12 and Salford made the extra man count soon after, with Burgess completing a stunning hat-trick following a world-class offload from Lafai.
The Samoan dummied his man before flicking the ball around his back for his left-edge partner to receive and dive over in the corner.
Speaking to the press post-match, Salford boss Paul Rowley was impressed by Lafai and Burgess’ performances, but stressed the fact the whole team had to play well to earn the points in such a tough fixture.
Rowley said: “They definitely provide a bit of entertainment. That is high on our priorities – obviously, we want to win – but you know how I like to play, we like to entertain if we can and we’ve got some good players on our team that can come up with some good plays.
“You can go back to Budge’s (Burgess) catch in the first half above his head in traffic or the flick pass from Tim Lafai, there are some good moments, but across the park, every time we win it’s so hard to pick an individual we are just that sort of team that we need everyone to fire.”
Moving on to discuss Marc Sneyd, who scored a quite stunning 40/20 to relieve a lot of Castleford pressure, Rowley says his star man has been the difference in some of Salford’s finest wins this season.
The boss continued: “I’m sure he’s done one already at Hull away this year, but in the context of the game, we were doing it tough at that point. We’d gone into our shell, we’d stopped playing, we’d lost quite a lot of shape in attack, and that was a massive momentum changer – it was a big, big play.
“I think all our wins this season have included big moments from Sneydy and it would have been interesting to see in the Wigan and St Helens game if he would have come up with some big moments there.”
Salford now have a week off to rest and recuperate ahead of a mouthwatering contest against Hull KR in Round 14.
