We took the players to Keighley Boxing Club this week to add a bit of variety to training and they were introduced to my old school pal, former pro boxer John 'The Sadist' Daly.

Although now into his 40s John can still mix it with the best and put the lads through a tough session on the bags. He saved the best till last and paired the boys up for some sparring.

Now we have some tough guys in our ranks but not many have mastered many of the finer points of the noble art, Matty Firth and Matty Steel looked quite handy and Ricky Helliwell and Matt Foster were fairly sharp, but if they want to continue with winning pay, they should stick with the funny shaped ball!

Danny Ekis has been named in the 17 to face the Super League Under-21s next Tuesday evening, the game is at Hilton Park Leigh. We've arranged training so we can go and offer our support.

He turned up for training last week in his new 'National League' gear sporting a big grin.

Now training gear goes missing more often than Matty Steel's mobile phones (he's lost about six), nothing is sacred. Mick Durham got out of the shower the other night to find his towel had gone, looking around Mick see's Ekis chatting away whilst drying himself on Mick's towel: "Sorry mate I forgot mine," says Danny.

Better keep your eye on the new clobber Dan, Dundee's got his eye on one of your nice new T-shirts.

I presume Olly Wilkes wasn't happy being compared to Stan Laurel and decided to change his hairstyle for the Barrow game, this time Olly sported a cross between a Billy Idol and Johnny Rotten crop. The Barrow players must not have appreciated his new look and for the best part of the game tried to knock his head off completly -- IT'S not like Oliver to attract that sort of attention!

On Sunday he took everything they could throw at him and he still kept coming back for more without getting drawn in, well done Olly .

Don't be starved of action this weekend the Academy are at home to Salford, on Saturday, kick off 2.30 at Cougar Park.