Sunday sees Hornets take on Dewsbury Rams - the day's only Championship game on a weekend dominated by the Derek Beaumont Empty Wembley Cup™.
This is the game that was postponed way back in the halcyon days of Round 1 when we were all filled with the vim of wide-eyed optimism - but when, unfortunately, Spotland's erstwhile Groundsman was busy juggling other priorities prior to his premature ejection.
Dewsbury come into this Sunday's game having squeezed a draw out of a Halifax side with one eye on Saturday's Challenge Cup semi Final and shorn of talismanic half Scott Murrell following a late shot early in the game.
Halifax looked to be home and hosed after Fairbank's 71st minute try gave his side a 12 point lead, but a late, late brace from Rams wing Rob Worrincy snatched the point.
Post game, Rams Coach Lee Greenwood said: "... when you’ve been 12 points behind late on you’ll take a point and we’d have taken a point before the game. It shows where we are - fighting and competing.”
Greenwood's only doubt for Sunday is Lucas Walshaw who is carrying a groin injury. If wily campaigner Paul Sykes starts at Spotland he'll clock up his 100th game for his hometown club: another impressive landmark following on from his recent 450th career appearance.
With six games of the season remaining, the Rams sit third bottom, ten points ahead of Hornets, leaving Hornets facing the near-impossible odds of delivering a clean sweep of wins - and Dewsbury delivering six straight losses - to stay up. But before we get carried away with quantum mathematics, remember that Dewsbury flogged Hornets 66 - 10 at the Tetley Stadium last month - in what was possibly Hornets' shoddiest performance of the season. So any improvement from there will be relative progress
Last week's blow-out half-century conceded at Post Office Road bumped Hornets' average 'against' score over the 45 mark and the average 'for' down to 13 - so there's the benchmark for this weekend.
But in the spirit of optimism with which we approached the original fixture, a win on Sunday would boost confidence no-end - restoring at least some belief to Hornets' emotionally wrung-out supporters. And with Batley waiting over the Horizon, you'd like to imagine that there are two potential victories to be had before the run-in of Leigh, Toronto, Halifax and Bradford.
See you Sunday
