Hull FC head coach Lee Radford urged his side to show their clinical edge ahead of Sunday’s clash with Castleford Tigers.
The Black and Whites currently sit top of Super League, two points above Wigan Warriors and Catalans Dragons, heading into the final five rounds of the regular season.
Last week’s 12-19 victory over Warrington Wolves saw Hull move clear at the top of the table, while a further two points this weekend could extend that gap.
Reflecting on the Warrington win, Radford admitted there is still room for improvement despite his side’s recent run, with enhanced finishing hot on the agenda.
“It’ll be a real tough one I think this week so making sure we play a little bit better with the ball coming out of own end is really important and I’d love for us to defend how we did against Warrington and also I’d like to see us be as clinical as we were down their end of the field,” he told TotalRL.
“We only had five good ball stats down their end, scored twice got two drop outs and a drop kick so we’d love to repeat that but we’re going have to perform well to get something out the game.
“As a rule we’ve not had a great deal of success there over the last couple of seasons and likewise they haven’t and they’ve usually responded to a loss pretty well the week after.”
“I think it’s making sure we’re at our best at the right time and by no stretch have we taken our foot off but we haven’t been as clinical as we’d of liked to have been and that gives our something to strive for every week.
“We need to be good with the football this week and make sure we take those opportunities but likewise it’s about replicating our defence from last week because I thought we defended really well.”
While their current league position shows the steady ground made as a side this season, Hull are also hoping to continue their run in the Challenge Cup, with a quarter-final against Catalans Dragons in a fortnight.
With almost a full squad available for selection, Radford will be no doubt mulling over his side to face Castleford, but he insisted the Cup game will not dictate his starting seventeen.
“That’s massive and you look at 12 months ago we had 14 players and we had to register two of the academy players the same day we played against Wigan so we’ve just got to make sure we keep doing everything right physically to ensure we have that clean bill of health going into the eights,” he added.
“They’re both as important as each other so we’re just going to continue to pick the squad that we feel can get the job done that week and prepare as well as we can because ultimately the result is how we prepare and when we’ve not been bang at it we’ve been found out.”
