East make the short trip to St Judes this Saturday after picking up their first win in three league matches against Bradford Dudley Hill last weekend (28-36).

East will be buoyed by the win and the return of influential pack men Dean Balmer, Craig Wingfield and Phil Bickerstaff. They will be hoping for another solid performance away from home and their second away win of the season. 

Jake Beaumont misses out with bruised ribs, Sam Grainey is on tour with GB U23’s and Adam Holland is struggling with a persistent groin injury. 

Judes are running hot at the moment and the players seem to have taken to new first team coach, Martin Cunningham. After three league wins on the bounce against Saddleworth (36-24), Blackbrook (50-22) and Stanley rangers (60-0) confidence will be sky high and rightly so. 

Explosive full back Darrion Ball has been a constant threat to opposing teams all season and a mixture of youth, new enthusiasm and experience guiding them round the park in half’s Dean Hunt, Paul Pendlebury and Nathan Bevan seems to have re-galvanised the Wigan based club. Like East, Jude’s have had some poor league form in recent years but they are obviously on their way back and have rebuilt after last year’s disappointment of being relegated from division one. Jude’s will be hoping they continue their revival and pick up another two points at home. 

Head coach Paul Wingfield commented: “Jude’s away is always a tough test, they are a well drilled team with a new coaching set up that has got them playing some attractive rugby. In recent weeks they’ve really racked up some points, so defensively we will have to be switched on right from the start and stay focused for eighty minutes. I expect the game to be played at pace with both sides trying to play attacking rugby and I suppose, like always….. It will come down to who can hold their nerve in the arm wrestle and execute set plays well enough under pressure, to come up with the points needed to win the game”. 

Commenting on last week’s win at Bradford Paul added: “The first half was probably our best forty minutes of the season so far. We scored 24 points, missed four goals and only conceded the one try. Our completion rate was over 80% and we gave no penalties away in a first half that was virtually error free. After the break we bombed three or four great chances early doors, which really would have finished the match off and then allowed Bradford to claw their way back into the game. We lost Curtis Littlewood to injury before we even kicked off and then both Billy Aldred and Chris Penn struggled with injuries for most of the second half, which meant we played the majority of the game with only fourteen men. Late on that showed and Bradford really put us under pressure. I was happy and relieved when the full time whistle went but also proud that we’d picked up our first win away from home against a very good side”.