Steve McNamara hailed Lesley Vainikolo "absolutely outstanding" after the winger guided the Bulls into the Challenge Cup quarter-finals.

The Tongan giant touched down twice as Bradford, who had Chris Feather stretchered off with a broken ankle, defeated Wakefield 14-4 to make it into the hat for tomorrow's draw.

The valuable double saw Vainikolo's record stretch to a remarkable 143 tries in 145 Bulls matches.

But McNamara said: "Never mind his two tries, the whole contribution to that game was probably the best I've seen from Les since I've been the coach.

"We've all seen games where he's scored three, four and more tries but today his whole demeanour, the way he played and conducted himself was the best yet. Les was absolutely outstanding out there."

Gloucester are expected to soon announce the capture of Vainikolo in a cross-code deal but McNamara would not be drawn on speculation.

He did rue the club's injury woes though after substitute Feather suffered a season-ending injury just seconds into the second half.

"We got some shockers again," McNamara admitted. "We lost Jamie Langley inside the first minute with a hamstring and then Chris as well, who's fractured and dislocated his ankle - a bit like Andy Lynch did last year.

"Michael Platt was really brave and copped one on the hip as he went down for a ball. He had to come off. Paul Deacon has had a nerve problem in his shin but we just had to keep him out there.

"We were left with just one change with 25 minutes to go, which wasn't ideal, but we're through."

The Bulls were far from their best but the crippling injuries and playing amid incessant rain meant it was always going to be difficult to gain any fluency.

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