Salford Red Devils ended their winless run in Super League by beating Wakefield 24-16 away to keep their top-eight hopes alive, while also ensuring the Brian Smith era at Trinity started with yet another defeat.
With six games left before the bottom four are cast adrift into a separate competition with the Championship’s top four, eight straight defeats had left Salford in deep trouble and their coach, Iestyn Harris, under pressure.
But, in an unsurprisingly low-quality affair between out-of-form sides, the captain Harrison Hansen and the England international Rangi Chase provided just enough spark to get Salford over the line, a run stretching back to mid-April.
They are only three points adrift of the top eight with more than enough games to claw back that deficit, and Harris admitted the match was more about the result as opposed to performance.
“It was as painfully slow a game as I’ve seen for a while,” Harris said. “It was a massive banana skin for us with their new coach, and to get the win is important for us going into the back end of the year. Some of the players had forgotten the words to the victory song, that’s how long it’s been since we sang it.”
But while Salford could celebrate a rare win, for Wakefield, the nightmare continues. They have never finished bottom of Super League before, but after their 15th consecutive league defeat, their new coach Smith saw first hand just what a tough job he has to keep the Wildcats above water come the business end of the season.
“Two of the things we worked on this week we got a significant improvement in,” he said, opting to look at the positives. “There’s still plenty to work on and some disappointing aspects, but by and large it’s a solid improvement on where we were last week.”
The Red Devils led from the ninth minute when the want-away half-back Theo Fages scored, and after Scott Taylor and Harrison Hansen extended the lead to 18-6 either side of a well-worked try from Wakefield’s Dan Smith, the Wildcats were always chasing their tails.
A strong start to the second half offered brief hope for Wakefield, and after Ian Kirke scored his first try for the club, the Wildcats were desperately unlucky when they had a Chris Riley try chalked off. It would prove unfortunate, as just 50 seconds later Hansen scored his second try to seal the result, with Danny Kirmond’s try in the final quarter scant consolation for the winless Wildcats.
Wakefield Miller; Johnstone, Arundel, Ryan, Riley; Godinet, T Smith; Scruton, Howarth, Annakin, Washbrook, Kirmond, D Smith.
Interchange McShane, Simon, Kirke, Kavanagh.
Tries D Smith, Kirke, Kirmond. Goals Arundel 2.
Salford Evalds; Caton-Brown, J Griffin, Sa’u, Johnson; Chase, Fages; Morley, Tomkins, Taylor, Paterson, Walne, Hansen.
Interchange Hood, D Griffin, G Griffin, Walton.
Tries Fages, Taylor, Hansen 2. Goals J Griffin 4.
Referee R Hicks. Attendance 3,240.
