• Huddersfield Giants 22-4 HullHuddersfield added credibility to their position at the summit of the Super League table and doubled their lead to two points by grinding down a Hull team who showed that their equally unexpected presence in the top five is no fluke either.”A tough, hideous win,” said Nathan Brown, the Giants’ Australian coach who is to join St Helens following season.It took them 62 minutes to score the first try of an attritional game in steady drizzle as Hull defended with a resilience that was all the more admirable considering the effort and emotion expended in their derby win against Hull KR on Excellent Friday.Lee Radford, the club’s assistant coach who had come outside of retirement for that game since of a glut of injuries in the pack, again performed manfully. However Hull finally cracked when Eorl Crabtree, the pony-tailed enforcer who is the homegrown personification of Huddersfield’s nickname, made one powerful charge also many at their border and crashed over from close range.Danny Brough’s simple conversion extended the lead to 8-4 and, after Luke Robinson darted over from acting half six minutes later, Brough capped an inventive and controlled individual performance with a quicksilver break from deep inside his own half to send Joe Wardle over on the left.”We were outside on our feet at the end there,” said Peter Gentle, the Hull coach. He is the latest in a extended border of Australians to express bemusement about British rugby league’s Easter bonanza which has required players to turn outside twice in quick succession for more than a century.”I don’t intellect it, not a bit,” responded Brough, the tattooed schemer from Dewsbury who must be the favourite to be England’s starting scrum-half for the mid-season fixtures against the Exiles, after missing at the end autumn’s Four Nations series through injury.”We get paid to play and the clubs get a abundance of human beings through the gate over Easter, so you’ve just got to get on with it.” The 9,950 attendance was Huddersfield’s highest of the season and an aggregate of 65,347 from the seven Easter Monday fixtures took the total for the weekend well beyond 150,000 at a five-figure average per match.Wigan climbed to second with a 36-6 win against Wakefield and Bradford also completed an Easter double with a 38-4 romp at Widnes to consolidate their position in the top eight. However the most eyecatching result of the day came in Perpignan, where Catalan Dragons demolished Warrington 44-16 in front of a capacity 11,500 crowd at the Stade Gilbert Brutus. The Dragons are immediately level with Wigan and, like Huddersfield, demanding respect as genuine contenders.Huddersfield Giants Eden; McGillvary, Cudjoe, Wardle, Murphy; Brough, Grix; Mason, Lee, Fa’alogo, Lawrence, Molloy, Brown (capt). Interchange Crabtree, Robinson, Patrick, Chan.Tries Crabtree, Robinson, Wardle. Goals Brough 5.Hull FC McKinnon; Sharp, Turner, Yeaman, Briscoe; Ellis, Seymour; Radford, Houghton, Lynch (capt), Manu, Tickle, Whiting. Interchange Aspinwall, Kent, Bowden, Pitts.Goals Tickle 2.Referee J Minor (Leeds) Attendance 9,950.Super League XVIIHuddersfield GiantsHull FCSuper LeagueRugby leagueAndy Wilsonguardian.co.uk © 2012 Twitter News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Employ of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
DOWNLOAD: Trisomy 18