Hull FC head across Yorkshire to take on former boss

Hull FC travel to the Mend-A-Hose Jungle this weekend to take on former boss Lee Radford’s Castleford Tigers, with Radford facing his former club for the first time since his dismissal two years ago.

The Tigers have got off to the worst possible start under Radford, and the Black and Whites will hope to inflict a fourth straight defeat after they got back to winning ways with a dominant 48-16 win against Salford last weekend.

FC are also boosted this weekend with the return of Andre Savelio, plus Kane Evans is in contention to make his debut for the club with his NRL ban now behind him.

Despite Castleford’s poor start, Brett Hodgson hasn’t underestimated the problems they will pose to his side.

“We’re playing against a team that will be desperate to win, there’s no doubt about that.

“They’ll be desperate, probably more so than they have been in previous weeks with the obvious reason of who their coach is and some recent players.”

“We’re going to have to look at the good things from this week and learn some stuff from this week and make sure that we’re ready to go because we know they’ll come firing.

In the Castleford camp, Radford has revealed that key man Danny Richardson will be sidelined for a lengthy period, starting with Sunday’s game after a neck injury initially sustained in Round One.

“I think Danny is going to be 11-12 weeks,”

“He is in a neck brace at the moment, so it is pretty long term. There is a bone fracture in there and it is eight weeks with a brace on then, past that, you’ve got to strengthen everything up in and around there.

“In round one, it wasn’t the news Danny or the club wanted, but it’s the cards we’ve been dealt and we’ll have to be more reliant on Jake Trueman and Gaz O’Brien to grab the team by the horns and get us around the field.”

Leading up to the contest against his former employers, Radford has stated his sole focus has been on his current side and hasn’t been drawn in by the hype surrounding it.

“I saw the scoreline and some of the highlights from last week, but I haven’t watched a lot of them,”

“I’m concentrating on what we need to get right rather than what they’re throwing at us at this moment in time.”

“We desperately need a win for between our ears,”

“There are things we can do in our performance that will enable us to get a result. I’d love to get both, that’s the perfect scenario for me.

In FC’s win last week against Salford, it was Jake Connor who stood out with a number of assists, but Radford insists that the Black and Whites’ star man will only cause his side problems defensively.

“Down our end a lot; down the other end, not too much.”

When questioned about these comments from his predecessor, Hodgson stated that he hasn’t read anything into them whatsoever.

“I don’t worry about it but the players were talking about it.

“We’ll see what happens at the weekend. I’m happy that Jake’s on our team, put it that way.”

The Black and Whites will look to extend an impressive record against Castleford, losing just one of the last five meetings.