Willie Peters reveals major ‘concern’ as Hull KR suffer latest title setback

Willie Peters admitted he was concerned with Hull KR’s performance following their defeat to Wakefield Trinity.

Rovers lost at home for the first time in over a year and in truth, they were well beaten by a Wakefield side who beat them up through the middle of the park.

The Robins have been struggling for form since their Challenge Cup defeat to Wigan Warriors and this was another performance in which they struggled to hit the levels they reached last year. They’ve now lost four of their last seven games.

Speaking on Sky Sports, Peters did not hide his disappointment.

“Very disappointed to be honest,” Peters said. “I didn’t see it coming, to be honest, a really poor performance. We were disciplined, we weren’t patient and didn’t connect. They came straight us. It’s a performance we aren’t proud of.”

Asked where he felt his side had fallen shory, Peters added: “We’ll have a chat about that now. We’ve got principles to not come through us and protect our inside shoulder, but they came through us pretty much every try.

“I’ll go watch it, I won’t pinpoint as there’s a lot. But it’s concerning.”

With that defeat, Rovers are now fifth in Super League, level on points with Leigh Leopards in seventh. They do have a game in hand which they will play against Warrington Wolves next month.

And Peters said his players needed to take responsibility for the manner of their disappointing performance – with the defending champions now set to end the weekend in sixth place should St Helens defeat Toulouse Olympique on Sunday afternoon.

He said: “Players need to be accountable, staff need to be accountable. The scoreline said it was 20-6 but I’m not bothered about the scoreline, I’m bothered about performance and that was a really, really poor performance.

“We got back at half-time to 6-6 and we had a lot go against us in that first half. We had an opportunity in that second half with a bit of wind behind us to put some pressure on them but we didn’t do that. We were on the back foot the entire time and it was our doing.

“We came up with errors, ill-discipline, yellow cards, penalties with the ball three times, it hurts.