Preview: Castleford Tigers vs London Broncos, Pre-season, 21/1/24.
It is the first game week of 2024 for the recently promoted London Broncos, who begin the first of their three-game pre-season with a trip to the Mend-A-Hose Jungle to take on Castleford Tigers.
This will be the first time that the Broncos have taken the field for a match since our historic 18-14 victory in the 2023 Championship Grand Final vs Toulouse Olympique.
Since the final, the Broncos have had a mix-up in the team with the signings of Sadiq Adebiyi, Robbie Storey, Hakim Miloudi, Josh Rourke, Jack Campagnolo, Rhys Kennedy, Gideon Boafo, James Meadows & Jack Hughes. This is the first opportunity for us to see these players take the field as Broncos and to get a feel as to how the team is coming together before the start of the 2024 Super League season.
Prior to this weekened's clash we caught up with one of our new signings, Josh Rourke, who says “It’s definitely been a big step up from what I have been used to while playing part-time rugby… I feel like I am as fit as I have ever been.
“We’re at the backend of pre-season now which all the lads are quite happy about and we’re just looking forward to getting stuck into the games.
“The reason that I play rugby is to play matches and we have worked hard in the last couple of weeks, so I am really looking forward to putting what we have worked on into a gameday scenario”.
We have also added two assistant coaches, Ryan Sherridan & Jordie Hedges, and it shall certainly be interesting to see how the team has changed since last year due to their appointment.
Talking about the fixture, director of Rugby & Performance Mike Eccles says that “This is still very much a preparation phase for us, but we are excited to put into practice a lot of the things which we have been working on.
“There’ll be around 20 players that we will play”.
Castleford Tigers are a Super League team who finished 11th out of 12 in 2023 with a record of 6 wins & 22 losses. The Tigers have played one pre-season game already in 2024, beating League 1 side Keighley Cougars 54-0.
Castleford have won the last 5 games which they have played against the Broncos, with the most recent coming in the form of a 20-6 victory on the 10th of August, 2019. However, a lot has changed in the past 5 years and despite Castleford’s consistent run in the Super League, they are facing a motivated and fiercely competitive London Broncos side.
Despite the occasion being a pre-season matchup, it is certainly an occasion which is a great first step in what is going to be a huge 2024 season!
