Rochdale Hornets Preview

Coventry Bears v Rochdale Hornets

Sunday 13th March

3.00pm kick off

Butts Park Arena Coventry

The Bears kick off this week at home to Rochdale Hornets this Sunday.

Head Coach Tom Tsang commented on last weeks first outing and the game ahead.

"Despite the result, last week’s trip to Toulouse was a fantastic experience for all who were involved. Toulouse really looked after us in terms of transport, accommodation and facilities. Our preparation for the game really couldn’t have been much better, and we went into the contest confident of a good performance.

We started indifferently though, with a missed penalty kick to touch putting us on the back foot very early in the game and we were not able to get any sort of foothold for the first 40 minutes, where Toulouse were too strong, fast and efficient with the ball, and we struggled to change momentum.

In the second half we were much better and competed well for the most part, which was promising and good to see, but the amount of defending we did in the first half had taken its toll and we were never a genuine threat on the French try line.

The positive thing though is that the average age of the squad we took to Toulouse was 22, and being a young side we will be much better for the experience. We have now played two of the best sides in the competition in consecutive weeks – we now need to start putting our learning into action.

This week against Rochdale it doesn’t get any easier though. The Hornets will be hunting for a promotion challenge this season, and have the players to do so. We will back ourselves to get the job done though – provided we execute the fundamentals of the game, to get ourselves into the ‘arm-wrestle’."