Betts happy with hustling Widnes

Widnes coach Denis Betts was pleased with the spirit his team showed in Friday evening’s 22-22 draw at home to Wigan.

Despite losing Patrick Ah Van to a red card in the first half, the Vikings showed real character to stay in the game, particularly as skipper Kevin Brown also had to leave the field with injury.

“It was a physical enounter, we were 16 points down, I’ve lost my captain, I’ve got a bloke sent off, but we were actually playing alright!” Betts said.

“We were in the arm wrestle, we hustled and we harrassed. Once we got our rhythm, even with 12 blokes on the field, we looked pretty composed and pretty good for the draw.

“We’re really positive. We know we’ve played some good stuff.

“We’re really strong, and making some decisions on edges that are tough to make.

“Wigan asked questions with their movement all the time. We had to adapt the way we wanted to defend because they scored one try when Kevin Brown was still a little bit fuzzy, and then they scored again when we were down to 12 men.

“It’s just about us making those adjustments, and we hustled and hassled until the end of the game.

“What we’ve got here is a good bunch of kids who want to work hard for each other. They’re really tight-knit and want to protect each other all the time, and you saw that.

“We don’t play the scoreboard, the scoreboard is just an outcome of how we want to play as a group.”