Benson: Exciting times ahead

ROUGHYEDS coach Tony Benson believes this year’s Co-operative Championship One is shaping up to be a close-fought competition.

Without a game until the Easter weekend double-header against Hornets RL and Workington, Benson took the chance to watch both sides in action at Spotland yesterday, a game in which the home team stood up to a second-half revival to run out 32-24 winners.

The division is already looking to be a tit-for-tat battle with no sides obviously standing out from the rest.

Only two sides — third-placed Oldham and Blackpool, the latter having played one match — have unbeaten records at present, but Benson guards against reading too much into early-season form.

“What the first four or five matches do show is how well a team has prepared for the season,” said the Roughyeds coach, whose next match is on Good Friday, April 2, away to Hornets RL.

“From then on in, everyone will start improving and the trick is to keep on doing that until the end of the season.

“Some of the scores and situations so far have been very interesting. York have battled to get results against some of the teams who haven’t been tipped to do so well and Hunslet Hawks looked average against us but then got a great result against Halifax yesterday (winning 42-36 in the Northern Rail Cup).

“I saw Rochdale really stick it to Workington in the first half, while Doncaster seem to be improving after making a bad start to the year.

“And South Wales have done very well so far and have hung in there in games when they have been up against it. It makes for an exciting competition.”

Co-operative Championship One results: Gateshead 24, London Skolars 18; Hornets RL 32, Workington 24; Swinton 36, Doncaster 30; York 25, South Wales 24.