HALIFAX PANTHERS coach Kyle Eastmond has called for a sense of perspective as he prepares to take the faltering early Championship pacesetters to face his hometown team Oldham on Sunday.
After going through major financial troubles and dicing with relegation last year, the Calderdale club appointed the 35-year-old and put him in charge of a squad smaller in both size and budget.
Against that backdrop, the Panthers raised eyebrows by winning the first six league matches of Eastmond’s reign – but have lost three out of four since and have been knocked off the top of the table by Toulouse.
After bouncing back from their first defeat, 12-8 at home to Bradford, by winning 40-12 against London Broncos in West Yorkshire, Halifax were beaten 32-0 away to Toulouse and 30-6 at home to Doncaster.
And while obviously disappointed, Eastmond, who emerged from the junior ranks of the Oldham St Annes amateur club to star for St Helens and become a dual-code England international back, says the last two games in particular have taught him a lot.
“You always prepare a team to try to win, but we needed to know if we can climb that mountain week after week, and at this stage we can’t,” he said.
“In terms of moving forward and making progress, that’s a good thing for me to learn.
“I came into this job promising to be honest, and I think we are probably where we should be at this stage.
“Yes we have lost some matches, and no one is happy at that, and yes we need to get better, but at the same time, let’s keep some perspective.
“It’s a core group of 20 players who have reaped the benefits of a great pre-season and have given everything in every training session and every game.
“We’ve never got ahead of ourselves or got carried away with the league table, and we’ll dust ourselves down and keep working really hard to improve.”
