Powell believes England omission can motivate Castleford in 2016

Daryl Powell believes the decision not to use any Castleford players in the recent Internationals can be used as a motivator for next season.   

Tigers’ half back Luke Gale and 2015 Dream Team member Michael Shenton were both selected in Steve McNamara’s squad to face the Kiwis, as well as the warm up game against France, but neither were picked to play in any of the matches. 

This has lead to head coach Powell to express his disappointment, as well as surprise, that there was no Castleford representation in any of the games.

“I was disappointed for Luke Gale that he didn’t get in with England, I thought he deserved to play, he had an outstanding season,” he told the Pontefract and Castleford Express. 

“I suppose the difficuluty was that I don’t know how much of that Steve McNamara saw, so he’d be relying on some of the guys that were over here. Obviously they got the job done so you can’t argue too much, but for me I thought he was the first pick.”

“Michael Shenton is another one for who I was disappointed for, especially playing a backrower out of position,” he said. 

“Bateman did a reasonable job, and the last game was his best I thought, but Shenny’s been excellent as a player and a captain for us and was another who’s been unlucky not to be in the England team.”

But Powell was quick to say that both players and the club can now use this snub as motivation, in the hope his Castleford side can show more of the form they displayed throughout 2015.

“Galey can come back in and use it as motivation towards next season, and starting the season off as he finished the last one, being as superb as he was then,” he said.

“I was disappointed that we didn’t have anybody who took the field for England and I see it as a bit of a motivation for us as a coaching staff. You want your players to be playing at the highest level. We work as hard as we can to make sure they are good enough do it.”