Catalans Dragons 8-24 Warrington Wolves

 Catalans Dragons (8) 8

T : James Maloney

G : James Maloney 2

Warrington Wolves (12) 24

T : Ben Currie, Toby King, Jake Mamo, Gareth Widdop

G : Stefan Ratchford 4

Dragons : S.Tomkins, Davies, Whare, Langi, Yaha, Maloney, Drinkwater, Dudson, Da Costa, Bousquet, Whitley, McMeeken, Garcia

Subs : McIlorum, Séguier, Baitieri,  Kasiano

Warrington : Ashton, Thewlis, Mamo, King, Charnley, Ratchford, Widdop, Hill, D.Clark, Cooper, Currie, Hughes, Davis

Subs : Philbin, J.Clark, Walker, Mulhern

Where to start on this one eh?

It was a match of narrow margins at key moments. Let's be positive here. 

But it was an error strewn performance by the Dragons, something the coach had predicted in his post match interviews from the Salford win the week before. 

When they score a try off a triple bounce and Samkins throws an interception for a length of the field score its probably best to say its not your day. 

Its going to be an interesting watch at Wakefield this weekend as we need to ensure our usual travel sickness doesn't creep in after one bad result. 

Lezignan match denied again by Covid 19

 This top of the table clash has been postponed again from this weekend due to positive tests in the Lezignan camp. 

St Esteve 42-22 Albi

 St-Estève XIII Catalan (26) 42

T : Dezaria, Franco, Le Cam, J. Chan 2, T. Chan 3

G : Brochon 5

Albi (10) 22

T : Grabulos, Pedrero 2

G : Goze 5

St-Estève XIII Catalan: Brochon, Franco, Jobe, Carré, Tison, Zafra, Saliès,Dezaria, Meresta-Doucet, Cozza, Le Cam, J. Chan, Perez

Subs: Laurent, Khedimi, Scimone, T. Chan.

Albi : Goze, Pedrero, Boualem, Bianchini, Deburghgraeve, Cance, Binda, Molinier, Grabulos, Pomie, Bonilla, Camposet, Andral.

Subs: Walton, Zaurini, Hubert, Tailhades

Jordan Dezaria celebrated his return to the club and new contract by getting St Esteve up and running in this regulation win over Albi. 

After the Lezignan postponement it was good to get back up and running. 

You can enjoy the whole match (in case you missed it) here...

Dragons 42 - 6 Salford

There was a happy return to Stade Gilbert Brutus for the Catalans Dragons who hammered hapless Salford in this Superleague (the real one) encounter.

It was skipper Ben Garcia who once again got the scoreboard moving darting in from close range before more Samkins magic got Samisoni Langi over in the corner. 

New found try machine Josh Drinkwater spiralled over for the third before the wingers took over. 

This week it was Fouad Yaha who bagged a hat-trick with Tom Davies 'only' getting a single try!

There is still lots that the coach wants to put right and it will be interesting to see how we go against Warrington this weekend, but its has to be said so far so good. 

Catalans Dragons (20) 42
T : Benjamin Garcia, Samisoni Langi, Josh Drinkwater, Fouad Yaha 3, Tom Davies
G : James Maloney 7

Salford Red Devils (0) 6
T : Harvey Livett
G : Morgan Escaré

Key St Esteve clash falls foul of Covid 19

Hopes were high for this top of the table clash in Elite 1 over the weekend but the scourge of the world, Covid 19 prevented Justin Murphy and his side from taking the chance to build on their derby win over Palau the previous weekend. 

At this stage it isn't clear if this will be rescheduled, we hope sincerely that it will and that the Lezignan player is ok and not affected too strongly by the virus and their positive test. 

Palau 14 - 36 St Esteve

 Palau (8) 14

T : H. Miloudi 2

G : A. Miloudi 3

 

Saint-Estève-XIII Catalan (20) 36

T : Carré 2, Cozza, Flovie, Llong, Zenon

G : Franco 6

Super Romain Franco has added kicking to his already wonderful game and was able to ensure a decent away win in the derby over Palau. 

To be fair, since the home side sacked Olivier Elima we have been less into them as our second team. So feelings weren't as mixed as they were when the two teams last met. 

It was great to see Dragons coach Steve McNamara in attendance casting his eye over Justin Murphy and Greg Birds team. 

With the clubs new found strategy of going for younger home grown players over NRL cast offs I hope that this is the dawn of a truly new era for us. 

Dragons 26 - 6 Wakefield (Challenge Cup)

 Catalans Dragons 26 (8) 

T :  Sam Tomkins, Josh Drinkwater, Tom Davies, Gil Dudson

G : James Maloney 5

Wakefield Trinity 6 (6)

T :  Mason Lino

G : Mason Lino

Dragons produced a dominant performance to head on to meet Warrington in the Challenge Cup. 

Control and strong defence are not words usually associated with this team but both were available in abundance over the weekend. 

Sam Tomkins opened the scoring before we were pegged back at the break. A show and go from Josh Drinkwater got us ahead before Tom Davies and a first score for the club from Gil Dudson make it safe. 

Although in truth despite us being late back to pre-season compared to the English clubs we looked much fitting than Trinity in the closing minutes. 

It was really great to put on a show, especially with over 1m viewers on the BBC. 

Long may this continue !

Albi 24-30 St Esteve

 A narrow away win against Albi for the title chasing St Esteve side. 

No video highlights or much detail on this one so we will leave by saying... well done Justin and the lads :) 

Huddersfield 10-20 Catalans Dragons

A much more effective defensive performance by the Dragons saw them home against a physical Giants side over the weekend. 

With three tries and all 20 points before the half time break enough to get us over the line. 

Sam Tomkins and Tom Davies were on top of their game again with quality assists for Matt Whitley and Mike McMeeken. The English element in our squad proving their worth in a tough encounter. 

We will be going into the Wakefield cup tie in good heart. 

Dragons surrender Challenge cup home advantage

 In a repeat of last years competition, Dragons will face Wakefield on neutral ground to avoid the Yorkshire club having to quarantine in order to fulfil the fixture in France. 

The match has also been chosen for BBC tv and will be shown live on Saturday. 

This of course means a third consecutive week of travel from France to England for our coaching and playing staff. 

Catalans Dragons 29 Hull KR 28

Catalans showed all that is good and all that is bad about them in this bizarre match to open their 2021 Super league season. 

Having marched into what looked an unasailable lead with little over a quarter of the match to go they defaulted to normal behaviour in taking their feet off the gas allowing a Ryan Hall inspired KR to get back to 28 all taking the game into golden point extra time. 

Fortunately an inspired break from Artur Morgue was enough to set up James Maloney who showed due calmness and composure in slotting over the match winning field goal. 

Cue lots of relief and celebrations. 

It shouldn't of course have come to this. We had the game won and by some distance before that lazy mindset set in and we let the opposition back in. 

We concede way too many points away from home to be considered genuine contenders for honours and it looks like their is gong to be no chance in how things pan out for us in 2021. 

I accept that there are lots of issues with the travel, late pre-season etc. so we can put this one down to fitness levels as much as thinking they had done enough to get the W. 

Let's see how these issues get addressed as we go forward with the 2021 season.