Eamon O'Carroll compliments 'quality' Barrow Raiders

The Bulls are coming off the back of a defeat at Batley last time out, while the Cumbrian outfit defeated Featherstone Rovers.

Looking ahead to the showdown with the Raiders, O’Carroll said: “I’m not sure we will be favourites coming into this one; I really don’t know.

“I feel like it’s Groundhog Day and I’m saying the same things before a number of fixtures this season, that we must get the job done.

“I need 17 warriors who are ready to go and throw themselves into a game plan and sacrifice themselves to get the job done in what is going to be a tough fixture.

“We’re playing against a quality team – a team that compete really well for each other – also, a team that will be smelling blood.

“Teams will probably be viewing us as a wounded animal and they’ll be wanting to go for the throat, so we need to respond.”

Eamon O'Carroll will be hoping for a big response from his players this weekend (Image: Tom Pearson.)

Barrow are coming off the back of a stunning 25-12 victory at home to Featherstone, while in the previous game they competed well at Toulouse, eventually losing the contest 38-16.

With that in mind, O’Carroll has urged his players to be fully focused on the task at hand.

He said: “They’ll (Barrow) be in a good frame of mind after the win against Fev, so I’m hoping my players understand that.

“In preparation, of course, we look at things we need to do and improve on, but we also look at the opposition, and I believe that Barrow are a very competitive team, I really do believe that.

“You look at some of the things they are doing – some of the tries they scored against Featherstone – they’re really going to challenge us.

“They’ve got lots of energy, they charge their kicks down and they pick up scraps. They’re first to everything.

“These are some of the characteristics that I’d like us to pride ourselves on.

“We’ve done it well at points throughout the year, but Barrow seem to do it week in, week out and it doesn’t seem to be something that they’re just making up on the spot. It’s instilled in them and in their DNA.

“So, we have to make sure we are first to everything this weekend.”

Bulls were without captain Michael Lawrence at Batley, who pulled his hamstring in the last training session in the leadup to the game, and O’Carroll admitted that he proved to be a big loss.

He said: “There’s no doubt that we miss him when he’s not there, but we can’t rely on one player, our captain, to get the job done.

“It’s a collective effort, and I include myself in that.

“When we lose a player like Michael or Dan Smith, it’s clear that we’ll go away from things (game plan) but there might be games later on in the year when we don’t have them, so we need everyone to play their part.

“However, there is no doubt in my mind that we’re better for having them on the field.”

Unfortunately for Bulls, they’ll be without Lawrence again this weekend.

O’Carroll said: “We’ll assess Joe Arundel (ankle) ahead of Sunday (now made the squad), but Bruno (Lawrence) will be out for a period of time.

“Thankfully, we don’t have any fresh injury concerns which is something we can’t afford to have at this moment in time anyway."