Boss feels Bradford Bulls doing well given loss of leaders

Bradford’s other 30-somethings, Lee Gaskell, Jorge Taufua and John Davies, have spent varying amounts of time out injured this season too, meaning it has often been a relatively young side taking to the field, shorn of its most prominent leaders.

And Bulls head coach Eamon O’Carroll believes that shows that his team’s achievements so far this season, reaching an AB Sundecks 1895 Cup semi-final and winning seven of their opening 11 Betfred Championship games, have perhaps been slightly underestimated.

Chester Butler scores for Bulls on their way to an 1895 Cup quarter-final win over Swinton in March. (Image: Tom Pearson.)

He told the T&A: “I looked at where we were at and what we’ve had missing when we had our week off earlier this month.

“We’ve hardly had our one, six, seven and nine together and we’ve not had our two most senior pros, Dan Smith and Michael Lawrence, for the majority of the season either, so it’s huge credit to the playing group for applying themselves in the way that they have done.

“When you go through the list of who we’ve had missing for a number of games and our team changing regularly, it makes me a little more understanding over our lack of consistency from game to game.

“We could probably be harder on ourselves in some aspects of our game, but if we had a consistent team on the field each week, it would make a difference.”

Bulls’ injury crisis arguably peaked ahead of their home league game with high-flying Sheffield last month, yet a patched up side, which included teenage debutant Jacob Bateman, pulled off a stunning 28-10 victory.

Given the amount of absentees Bulls had that day, their win over Sheffield last month was arguably their best of the season so far. (Image: Tom Pearson.)

Bradford have won four of their five league games at Odsal this season and will look to improve on that record further on Sunday when Doncaster visit.

O’Carroll said: “The players actually referenced about wanting to make this place a fortress when I first joined.

“I don’t really buy into the fact that because it’s a smaller pitch, you have to play too differently on there.

“We know there’s certain things there we can get some joy with, but a lot of our principles don’t change between us playing at home or away.

“We look to do the same things, and everything’s based on the foundations we set and getting the fundamentals of the game right.

“We try and replicate that each week, regardless of the opposition or the field we’re playing on.

“It’s nice we’ve had some wins at home though, because I think it’s important you play to a good standard in front of your own fans.

“We do enjoy playing at Odsal as well.”

As for team selection against Doncaster, aside from Smith, O’Carroll does not expect anyone who was out injured for Sunday’s win at Whitehaven to return in time for this weekend.

And while Chester Butler is set to miss the Doncaster game with the hamstring issue he suffered in the warm-up in Cumbria, Kieran Gill’s shoulder injury appears to have healed in time for him to play at Odsal this Sunday.