Catalans Dragons improve survival hopes with home victory over Featherstone
The French side post back-to-back wins for the first time since April.
Catalans Dragons kept alive their hopes of an automatic place in Super League next season with a 26-12 victory over Featherstone.
Hull KR secured their Super League status for 2018 with victory over Widnes, meaning at least one team will drop out this season.
Catalans started the Qualifiers slowly but have now registered back-to-back wins for the first time since April, following their win over Halifax last weekend.
The hosts opened the scoring in the sixth minute, Krisnan Inu taking Richie Myler’s flat pass to reach out and touch down. Luke Walsh added the conversion.
Two minutes later, Benjamin Garcia was sin-binned following a dangerous tackle on Featherstone’s Scott Turner – and the visitors took advantage of the extra man in the 11th minute.
Keal Carlile raced away from the acting half before finding James Lockwood, the Rovers loose forward looked to be tackled before finding Sam Brooks with a neat off-load and Brooks dived over to score. Kyran Johnson added the conversion to level the scores.
Walsh edged the Catalans back in front with a penalty in the 15th minute following a high tackle on Remi Casty and they increased their advantage nine minutes later when Brayden Wiliame chased hard and managed to win the race to collect a Walsh kick and touch down in the left corner. Walsh missed with the touchline conversion attempt and the score remained 12-6.
Benjamin Garcia scored from close range, darting over from acting half after Jason Baitieri had been tackled short of the line. Inu took over the kicking duties and added the conversion from the left of the posts to increase the lead.
However, the visitors refused to go away and they were rewarded seven minutes from the interval when a loose Walsh pass was intercepted by Turner who raced away. Myler chased back but could not prevent the inside pass to Anthony Thackeray, who touched down under the posts. Johnson added the conversion to trim the deficit to six points at half-time.
In an ill-tempered four minutes, three players were sent to the sin-bin. Louis Anderson and Luke Briscoe went for fighting, while Carlile was sent from the field for 10 minutes shortly after for a late tackle on Walsh – a penalty Inu elected to kick at goal, successfully.
The tide had turned and the Catalans used the numerical advantage, Walsh sending Sam Moa over from short range in the 67th minute – Inu converting to complete the scoring.
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