Danny McGuire blasts Castleford Tigers’ ‘desperation’ and ‘resilience’ in ‘disappointing’ Hull FC defeat

In-form Hull, who climbed up to second with the win, had established a 24-6 lead thanks to tries from Herman Ese’ese, Aidan Sezer, Tom Briscoe and Lewis Martin, but late efforts from Tex Hoy and Josh Simm gave the scoreline a more respectable look.

But McGuire was far from impressed. He said after the game:

“I thought we were poor for the majority of the game. We found a bit of energy at the back end of the game which is disappointing. I wanted that energy from minute one.

“It is a bit of a cop out when you find it at 75 minutes. I was disappointed with that. It sends a poor message. We are not prepared to do the tough stuff at the minute.”

The Tigers’ first physical test came in the tenth minute when the excellent Ese’ese barged past the home defence to go over from close.

“We talked about Ese’ese,” McGuire revealed. “He’s a big man. I have played against some big men and they don’t score tries that easy. It looks like a man against under ten’s, it’s just crazy.

“When you are on your try line there should be that many bodies there preventing a try that he can’t do that. For the life of me I can't understand how he can do that and not be stopped by four or five.

“There is not enough desperation for me, there’s not enough resilience. We went four sets each at the start of the game and I just feel like we’re ready to crack, that we aren’t mentally tough enough to be able to push through that. I am almost waiting for it.”

And McGuire feels his players are making the same mistakes on a consistent basis.

He went on: “It was exactly the same last week. They scored a try down the short side where we got our numbers wrong. Then there was a break, an offload and Sezer comes from 40 metres behind and runs past five of our players who just watch him.

“It’s just not good enough. It’s nowhere near good enough. We have got some things to fix up. We have got some learning to do, we’ve got some educating to do, we have got some understanding to do, we have got some harsh words.

“I am delivering harsh words but we don’t seem to be learning. Some of the players are making the same mistakes week after week after week. I get that we have got a group that are younger and inexperienced but at some point we have got to learn.

“We have got to understand that we are letting each other down with some of the decisions and discipline we are showing. They need to learn soon otherwise it is going to be a long year.”

Here are some photos from the game, taken by Allan McKenzie/SWpix.com