Bulls 44 Harlequins 18

One crumb of comfort battered Tony Clubb can take this morning is that he'll never have to face the freakish Lesley Vainikolo again.

The rookie Harlequins winger, 19, got bashed, pulped, swatted away and trampled all over by the rampaging Bulls star, who helped himself to another hat-trick as his farewell tour continued.

Vainikolo, who has now amassed 147 tries in 148 Bradford games and taken his season tally to 17, will be gone at the end of next month.

While Clubb has only ever faced the man mountain once - albeit painfully - there are many bigger and better wingers who have been on the end of the same ceaseless punishment for years and they will be rejoicing knowing The Volcano is soon on his way.

For the Bulls fans though, they lapped up the man-against-boy contest, seeing their Kiwi hero roll back the years to deliver a ruthlessly swashbuckling performance.

It brought welcome relief as the game, despite what the scoreline might suggest, proved a generally dour affair.

The Bulls were still dealing with injuries and desperate to get a win of any sorts after two Super League defeats, while the visitors, despite a fine win at Warrington, had bigger problems with their own crocked list.

The rain made handling difficult, Bradford were competent and efficient while Harlequins were utterly dreadful in the first half, barely able to keep hold of the ball.

The game was won in that first 40 minutes as the hosts racked up a 22-0 scoreline.

Vainikolo got them off the mark after some opportunist build-up play from David Solomona, and James Evans gave him his first clear one-on-one with Clubb.

The teenager got clubbed as Vainikolo charged in and knocked him flying out of the way from 15 metres. Meat and drink.

Second time around, the 19-stone Tongan tonked his way in by bruising past Clubb with his brute upper body strength and then storming over the top of helpless full back Chris Melling.

Harlequins may have felt hard done by as it seemed Glenn Morrison coughed up the ball during the build-up but Vainikolo wasn't hanging around to wait for any answer.

It wasn't until the 28th minute that the stuttering visitors finally got some possession in the Bulls 20 after Michael Platt had spilled the subsequent re-start.

But they couldn't capitalise and Bradford, with prop Andy Lynch in dominant form, Morrison as busy as ever and Sam Burgess showing signs of the class that has him earmarked as a Great Britain captain of the future, rammed home their superiority with two more touchdowns before the break.

Another purposeful drive from the impressive Burgess set up the position for Ian Henderson to jump out of dummy half and send Joe Vagana crashing through a huge hole.

Burgess - playing against his elder brother Luke - then showed his footballing skills with a fine break that cut open the Quins defence.

The rangy young prop demonstrated good pace to get clear and then, despite eventually being collared by Melling and Jon Wells, had the awareness to squeeze out a pass for Paul Deacon to finish off.

Burgess was at it again soon after the break, creating the first try of the second half in similar circumstances, driving the ball forward and then slipping out a pass from the two-man tackle, allowing Glenn Morrison the chance to round Melling.

That killed Quins, who had moments earlier seen a Lee Hopkins try' chalked off after a touch judge intervened to rule Danny Orr's pass had sailed forward.

They conceded a penalty straight after for dissent, which marched Bradford further forward, ready for Burgess to strike, and were further frustrated as it seemed the teenager's own final pass was equally dubious.

Henderson mopped up another fortuitous Bulls try after ricochets galore in the corner, with Quins possibly feeling the effort should have been brought back.

At 34-0 down they did rally with tries from Wells and Chad Randall, Bradford switching off again, as has become a worrying trend this season. Later, Iestyn Harris threw another interception pass for Sykes to race in an easy score to take further gloss off the comfortable win but not before Vainikolo completed his treble.

Part-timer Richie Hawkyard, on at hooker, helped create the opening, showing good confidence near the line to ignore the experienced Deacon and Harris and go blind with a set move.

Platt came on to the ball to add the link and Vainikolo enjoyed the easiest of his three touchdowns, collecting a pass just inches out. This time Clubb couldn't be blamed; not even Clubber Lang would have stopped him from there.

Plasterer Hawkyard had been training with the Bulls all week and it showed as he seemed more in tune with his team-mates than on that hastily-arranged debut at Huddersfield last Friday.

However, when he scampered over for the eighth and final try of the afternoon it was all his own doing, dummying to cut through a gap, sprinting to the line and holding off two tacklers to memorably get over on his home debut.

The Bulls head out to Perpignan on Thursday, knowing they are back in the hunt for top spot.

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