Last updated 16:00, Wednesday, 28 May 2008

SALFORD may be streets ahead of any other side in National League One, but can Haven, so badly lamed by injuries, keep pace with them before another big Sky TV audience.

Added spice comes from Ged Stoke’s bold but welcome selection of four of his young guns, notably whiz-kid schoolboy Gregg McNally for his senior debut in direct opposition at scrum half to Salford’s own teenage sensation Richard Myler.

The City Reds are never off the set these days, they may not be as slick as they were in Super League last season but they still look good enough.

So how good, or how bad, will Whitehaven be tomorrow night in front of the cameras, can they rise above one of the most crippling injury lists I can recall in recent times and give the championship favourites a real run for their money.

Not many will put money on them to win, I’ll wager, but stranger things have happened when it comes to Whitehaven rugby league.

All but the most optimistic fans – and directors – are writing off their team’s chances of staging one of the season’s upsets but hopefully they’ll still be leaving the comfort of home and pub to cheer the side on to what has to be a confidence-building performance.

Haven’s last appearance on TV was actually against Salford at The Willows, it was only a few weeks ago but a lot’s gone wrong since with the loss of so many key players, and leaders, all at once.

Head coach Ged Stokes who was doing so well until those injuries struck knows that somehow he has to coax the best possible performance from his patched up charges and make Salford fight every inch of the way.

Ged’s coaching predecessor Paul Crarey said to me this week that he would love to see Haven give Salford the shock of their lives by turning in a Band of Brothers type display, an act of defiance when the chips are so well stacked against his former charges.

And if Paul felt he was hard done by losing his first two competitive games with the departures of star players John Duffy and Richard Fletcher already on the cards, then spare a thought for Ged.

He’s probably got it worse especially with so much pressure on his broad Kiwi shoulders but Haven’s board are backing him to the hilt as he continues to deal the best hand he’s got and if the youngsters prove to be aces so much the better.

The craggy New Zealander has a hard-edge to him, a man who seems more than capable of holding his nerve, as his players need to do in the circumstances and make sure that any talk of relegation – Haven are in the bottom two – is merely a temporary spectre and not in any way a realistic threat.

It’s not so long ago since Ged said publicly that Haven were “an excitement machine” in the making, it’s only time now and patience that can make those words prophetic and realistic.

It was Crarey who told me that in his opinion players won games, more so than coaches.

Simplistic perhaps but the point is taken. Paul Cullen, the man who created some of the building blocks for Haven’s renaissance over the last five years, will no doubt be reflecting on this after parting company with his beloved Warrington this week. This is the man once tipped to be a future Great Britain head coach, he’ll be back before long but it’s a fickle old game.

Ade Adebisi is one of the players who could conceivably go a long way towards turning Haven into that excitement machine.

This 21-year-old former Featherstone flyer and ex-London Bronco has exceeded all expectations since coming this far north, he has so much faith in himself and his new team’s prospects that he’s had no hesitation in adding another 12 months to his original two-year deal.

His performance at the JJB Stadium was impressive enough to have Wigan fans drooling and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it crossed the mind of former GB coach Brian Noble that the lad wouldn’t be a bad signing to do the business in Super League.

That remains to be seen but for the foreseeable future Ade’s heart very much belongs to the chocolate blue and gold.

In our conversation on Monday, Ade made it crystal clear how much he was enjoying his rugby at Whitehaven and was so philosophical about the injury crisis that when Haven get back to somewhere near full strength they will be good enough to beat any side in the division.

He means it and that’s exactly what the fans, fellow players and the directors want to hear.