BULLS coach Eamon O’Carroll cut a very frustrated figure after watching his team fall to a 25-6 defeat yesterday at Widnes Vikings in what was a chalk-and-cheese display.

The Bulls are still fourth, but are now only ahead of Widnes on points difference ahead of a trip to Barrow next Sunday.

A Max Lehmann try that was improved by Jordan Lilley gave the Bulls a 6-4 lead at half-time, but they lost the second half 21-0 and could gather no momentum as left winger Ryan Ince completed his hat-trick, and right winger Mike Butt and loose forward Max Roberts scored late tries, with influential scrum half Tom Gilmore adding two goals and a drop goal.

O’Carroll admitted: “ I am very disappointed. I just did not see the team that I thought I was going to see today - the things that we focused on, such as we knew we would have to be very disciplined against a well-drilled Widnes team who are dangerous if you hand the ball over to them, and that is all that we seemed to do.

“We lacked any sort of concentration and handed the ball over far too cheaply. I don’t know what the penalty count was, but there were too many and it killed the game for us.

“But fair play to Widnes. They executed on our deficiencies, and I have said that to the group.

“As a group we just separated and made far too many individual errors, and you cannot function as a group if we do that - and that would be against anybody.”

O’Carroll added: “We might have led 6-4 at half-time, but I still think that Widnes got us a couple of times, and that is frustrating.

“We started the second half and dumped our first three sets on the halfway line and gave them territory, but we only made two errors in that first half and our completion rate must have been in the high 90s.

“I don’t want to be too disrespectful to Widnes, but that defeat was down to us.

“We still had enough quality to stop Ryan Ince scoring those two tries in the second half. We had talked about it all week, and that is where my frustration comes from.

“We gave Widnes every opportunity to win that game, but in the first half we gave ourselves a chance.

“We then put no pressure on the Widnes line because we kept dropping the ball. The lads are knackered in there because they have done double the work, and that is not the first time that has happened this season.

“We fell off and just didn’t give ourselves a chance and now we are in a fight.

“We were undisciplined and loose, and the lack of game management is a collective and not down to an individual. We lost because we didn’t respect the ball.”

The Bulls were already missing 10 players injured or suspended, and added to the injury list yesterday was centre Jayden Myers and winger Liam Tindall.

O’Carroll explained: “We lost Jayden Myers to a HIA (head injury assessment) in the first half and Liam due to his shoulder.

“I am not sure who will be available for Barrow, but we can’t be feeling sorry for ourselves. We need to step up like we have done for large parts of the season.

“Let us get beaten because we have been beaten by a better team, not because we made it easy for the opposition.

“We have lads who are fit and ready to go, but we need to stand up and give it a go.”