Workington head coach Phil Veivers bemoaned his side’s slow start as they found themselves 32-0 down after just over 20 minutes against high flying Leigh Centurions.

“I thought we were like rabbits in the headlights for the first 20 minutes. But then again, we only had the ball for six tackles in that first quarter, so we were chasing our tails there,” said the Aussie.

The Centurions dominated the opening stages of the game and the sheer weight of possession was just too much for Town.

“‘It’s a big energy sapper when you don’t have the ball for that period of time,” he added.

“We turned a corner and we came back at them and scored a couple of tries. I thought it was a game of two quarters in that first half, I think we probably dominated that second quarter and they dominated the first quarter.”

Veivers was quick to point out that his side had come up against a team that was full of quality, but was disappointed with how some of the oppositions tries were scored.

“They’re a quality outfit, they train full-time. I still think there are a lot of soft tries thrown in there against us so that’s a worry for me but we just need to remain positive and sit tight together and work hard and we’ll come out of it the other side.”

Jarrod Sammut was Workington’s stand-out player yet Veivers believes the former Super League man can improve.

“He was lively but there’s some deficiencies there that he needs to work on as well but I’ll do some video with him this week. He’s obviously key to what we do, he’s strong for us and he did some good stuff out there.

“But there’s a couple of other parts of his game he needs to improve on,” said Veivers.

Town’s next game is the small matter of the Cumbrian derby versus Whitehaven and Veivers wants his players to remain positive ahead of the Good Friday clash.