After a difficult match away at Leigh this weekend Whitehaven RL are looking to up their game as the season begins.

Whitehaven have seen some difficulty lately getting beaten by Workington in the Ike Southward Memorial Cup game and again away at Leigh on the weekend, but they are remaining optimistic.

We spoke to new Head Coach Jonty Gorley on what his thoughts were about Whitehaven's current performance.

Mr Gorley said: "It's going to be tough as it was tough last year and everybody's now improved their squads and spent more money. We saw that on Sunday so the players now know that's what we're up against.

Jonty expressed his feelings on the weekend's game and said that Whitehaven played how they did in the friendlies, explaining that the side can't give teams like Leigh the amount of ball that was given to them.

He says that it was there discipline and ball control that let them down but in the second half the team started to improve their playing, at this point however it was too late.

Whitehaven were down to ten men by the end of the first half and this started to show early into the second half when they were over 30-0 down to Leigh.

Jonty says that they need to improve as they have made similar mistakes at Leigh as they did in previous games against Workington and Swinton.

Mr Gorley said: "We've got a recovery session this week and then on Wednesday where we'll look at some video from the game.

"Looking at how we can put some things right we'll also need to look at injuries as there were a couple who missed out on the weekend. I want know what my team will be until around Thursday."

He added: "We need to start performing like I know we can, we can't do it in fits and starts as the other team will come out on top if we keep performing like we are."

Whitehaven RL also said how amazed they were with the support over the weekend especially for an away match.

They will play Barrow Raiders on Sunday 6th February at 3pm at the LEL Arena in Whitehaven.