Fylde won derby day bragging rights thanks to a 41-27 victory over Preston Grasshoppers at Lightfoot Green, and Joint Head Coach Chris Briers shared his delight with the win with journalist Stuart McCracken.
He said: “I was very pleased with the result and performance. We started slowly and the first half was a bit of a battle, but we did some good stuff. I think in the second half we sort of went away from them and then we just kept giving them a little bit of a sniff and letting them back in.
“I thought that we had the job done but then took the foot off the gas. Ultimately, we got over the line and I’m pleased with the result.”
Fylde picked up the bonus point victory thanks to tries from Tom Carleton (2), Adam Lanigan (2) and Tom Forster and Briers picked out the areas he was most impressed with in the victory.
“We were much stronger in the scrum area compared to last week,” he said. “I think the main thing that we noticed was that we were miles better at the breakdown because last week we were making good carries, we were making yards and we’d lose the breakdown or we’d get penalised for holding on. So I think the breakdown was a big improvement today.”
Experienced fly-half Greg Smith returned to the starting 15 after missing the season opener against Sheffield Tigers and Briers believes he made a big impact, but also was keen to praise Alex Clayton who took his place in last weekend’s draw against the Tigers.
He said: “Greg’s a huge player for us in terms of controlling things. He’s such a talented ball player. He sees the pass and the space on the pitch so it makes a big difference to us, but at the same time Alex Clayton did a great job last week. He performed well so I wouldn’t want to say that it’s just because Greg’s come back in, but he does help with his experience.”
Outside centre Carleton put in an all-action performance in the midfield for Fylde and Briers was quick to praise the try scorer, who he believes will give many teams in National 2 North headaches when defending against him.
He said: “Tom on his day is unplayable. There were times where they were trying to stay off him and stay soft, but if you do that, you’re killing yourself. Most teams we play against, they’ll gun in on him, which creates loads of space for somebody else. Today, they did the opposite and when we hit him through the middle, he made yards.”
The derby victory takes Briers’ side onto eight points after the opening two rounds of the season, but the Head Coach stated that they tried to downplay the emotions of the match beforehand.
“For me, I try not to focus too much on the derby because with where we are and where we want to be, I think we have to take that kind of emotion out of things,” he said. “I think it’s hard for some people to get that out of them, but we try and play that down so that the lads are just focused on playing rugby against another team.”
Fylde return to the Woodlands next weekend when they take on Billingham looking to continue their unbeaten start to the National 2 North campaign.
[Photo above by ‘Hoppers Mike Craig. His excellent album is at https://bit.ly/3r92CSN. Reproduced gratefully with his permission.]