Broncos fightback extends winning sequence to four

Tony Rea, the London Broncos coach, was delighted with the way his side have bounced back from last month's 62-16 hammering at St Helens. The Broncos achieved their fourth successive win by staging a late fightback to beat Castleford at The Jungle 28-16 yesterday.

Rea said: "We have had four good wins on the trot and that is credit to the blokes after being smashed by St Helens. Every player was important in today's victory. It was always going to be a match where we had to hang in there."

The Castleford coach, Graham Steadman, felt his side had thrown victory away. "I am very disappointed," he said. "The game was there to be won and I cannot help feeling we lost it ourselves. The turning point came in the second-half when Johnny Hepworth's inside pass to Ryan Hudson was ruled forward and he was brought back from a certain try."

Salford boosted their National League title hopes with a 32-16 win over Rochdale at Spotland, replacing the Hornets in second place in the process. The Reds were only denied top spot by Leigh's 31-12 defeat of Dewsbury.

Rochdale matched Salford in the first-half and went ahead 10 minutes after the interval thanks to a Gareth Price try. But scores from Danny Arnold, Stuart Littler and Cliff Beverley gave Salford a comfortable winning margin despite Alan Hunte being ordered off along with Rochdale's David Larder for brawling.

Leigh were made to fight hard for their win over the Rams, who staged what had seemed an unlikely second-half comeback after the Centurions had established a 15-0 lead before the break. Nathan Batty scored a sensational 80-yard try for Dewsbury but the home side's hopes were dashed by a score from John Duffy.

The former Oldham Bears centre Howard Hill returned to Boundary Park to earn Whitehaven a point in a 22-22 thriller with Oldham.

Hill did not figure on the scoresheet, but he made three second-half tries for Steven Wood, Aaron Lester and Mark Wallace, whose touch six minutes from the end put the Cumbrians level.

Oldham's Neil Roden and Whitehaven's Darren Holt were both wide of the mark when going for match-winning drop goals in a hectic finale.

Featherstone reversed a 10-0 deficit to win 34-18 at home to Batley, scoring 20 unanswered points in 12 minutes.

Injury-hit Doncaster crashed to their heaviest home defeat of the season as Hull KR scored seven tries to win 43-22.

In National League 2, London Skolars are still looking for their first win of the season after they were hammered 64-98 at Chorley for whom Mark McCully scored 24 points.

Keighley, the leaders, thrashed Gateshead 52-6 to stretch their lead over Hunslet who were beaten 40-18 at home by York. Barrow beat Swinton 42-20 while Workington lost 29-16 at home to Sheffield.