Adrian Lam ‘always believed’ Leigh would get the job done despite late scare at Barrow

Leigh Centurions head coach Adrian Lam insisted he was always confident that his team would get the job done against Barrow Raiders, despite them suffering a big scare.

On their quest for promotion from the Betfred Championship, the Centurions have now won 11 league games in a row as well as picking up the 1895 Cup along the way in defeating Featherstone Rovers last weekend.

Up in Cumbria, Lam’s side were pegged back from leading 18-4 at the interval to trail 28-24 with just seven minutes remaining. Blake Ferguson eventually restored parity with the winning try, though Barrow’s Jarrod Sammut missed a penalty conversion in the closing stages which would have drawn them back level.

“Having belief in each other is what got us through today,” said Lam whose side can ill-afford any slip-ups if they are to pip Featherstone to the league title.

“They led with ten minutes to go but I always thought that we’d get that back, it was just a matter of believing in ourselves for me.

“In the set after they scored to go in front, I thought that was our best defensive set. For that, I’m really proud of them.”

Papua New Guinean Lam also admitted that he thought a short turnaround had played a part in the slackness on show from his side at times.

Beating Fev in that 1895 Cup final last Saturday, the Leythers rotated their lineup quite heavily with another test on the horizon in just three days’ time as Halifax Panthers visit the Leigh Sports Village.

He added, “It’s always a tough ask after a real high last weekend to come back and play well with such a short turnaround.

“We’ve had a plan for this weekend – like most clubs have – and we’ve picked seven new faces today who didn’t play in the final. We also had 10 positional changes today too.

“When you do that, there’s always going to be clunkiness, and I expected that. I just thought we had a really good 40 minutes, and then 40 that were really poor.”

Already detailing before the trip to Barrow how he wasn’t a fan of the Championship ‘double header’, the fixture list isn’t getting any easier for Leigh.

They’re on the road much more in the coming weeks with trips to both Workington Town and Whitehaven both lined up in the coming weeks.

“We’ve only got two games at home in the next six weeks, they’re the next two games,” said Lam

“We’ve got to make sure we absolutely nail them. We got the two points in the end here today, so we’ll take that and move on”.

After welcoming Halifax on Sunday, Leigh’s next match is the all-important one. Leaders Featherstone come to town on Monday, June 13 live in front of the Premier Sports cameras.

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