Coach Brian Noble today blamed the Bulls' shock 50-22 home defeat against St Helens last night on 'fundamental flaws'.

It was the World Club champions' first Tetley's Super League defeat at Valley Parade or Odsal for over two years.

But Noble promised his side would bounce back from this hefty top-of-the-table setback.

"We came second," he said bluntly. "We were well beaten by the better side.

"A few of our fundamentals went sadly awry, but we have done our fair share of winning and we have to learn from it.

"Saints just played a little too fast for us off the ground and we were caught napping and let some tries in that we don't normally.

"Also we overplayed in certain areas and weren't patient, and paid the price for that against a team like St Helens."

Saints and Bulls are now level on points at the top. However, looking on the bright side, Noble added: "It will spark us up for the back-end of the year, but we are still in a good position.

"We are still top of the competition, we have five games left and we are looking forward to them.

"We were great in the first 20 minutes, but overall we will have to take our defeat on the chin."

The warning signs were in evidence when second-in-the-table Saints led 22-10 at the interval.

Noble said: "I felt we could have gone in at 16-16 at half-time as we gifted them a try right on the

half-time whistle which could have gone the other way.

"That was a 12-point shift, but we were still in the game. However, conceding one so early in the second half gave us too much of a mountain to climb."

The Bulls hit the road straight after the game to travel to Twickenham for today's Middlesex Sevens.

Noble, though, ruled their participation in the charity rugby union event as a significant factor in their defeat.

"There have been a number of distractions during the week," he said without elaborating.

"Whether that was one of them I don't know, but I would hope they were professional enough to put it to the back of their minds until today.

"We'll just concentrate now on bouncing back a week tomorrow, and I am sure we will be pretty focused at Castleford."