REACTION | Horne wants improvement

[Dons News]

Richard Horne believes basic errors prevented the Dons from beating Batley Bulldogs in the pre-season friendly at the Club Doncaster Sports Village.

The Dons were beaten 36-34 in the final game before the Betfred League One season gets underway, and the head coach saw plenty of room for improvement.

He said: "I thought the opening 20 minutes was really good from our point of view, we gave a good account of ourselves but couldn't quite build any momentum.

"Basic individual errors cost us massively, particularly in the first half. Against a team like Batley you can't afford to be making those mistakes too often.

"We would get a penalty and then lose the ball, when we got any field position we'd come up with an error, and when you do that a Championship team will punish you."

Horne's side scored three late tries to reduce the deficit against the Bulldogs, and he says that is a good omen for the 2018 campaign.

He added: "I haven't got any issues with our fitness, the lads have trained really hard and i think that was obvious from the way we finished the game with some nice tries.

"We've finished both friendlies with some momentum so i know if we're chasing games in the league then we're always going to be a threat.

"I've got what i wanted to out of the two games, i think in phases we've looked really good and scored some good tries, it's all about making sure we value the ball more in possession."

Tickets for the Dons first league game against Coventry Bears on Sunday February 18 are available from the Club Doncaster Box Office, on 01302 762576 or at tickets.clubdoncaster.co.uk

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[phildog]

From a Dogs point of view I have to congratulate Donny on that performance yesterday: normally it's us who plays for 80 minutes, but we put the cue on the rack too early yesterday. It'll be your coach not ours who will be happy with the performances. Even allowing for the fact that it was a 'friendly' a)teams still want to win b)players want to perform to get their spot in the team in the first league game. Also allowing for the fact that coaches don't want a lengthening injury list (ours is already up around the 7 mark), neither do they want to see their players disrespecting the opposition and thinking they've got it won. Batley did that yesterday and were nearly found out. That was the hardest fought of the 4 games we've played. Good luck to the Dons for the season