Excited about the play-offs (From Leigh Journal)

Excited about the play-offs

1:56pm Thursday 1st September 2011 in Centurions

LEIGH Centurions end the regular season at Dewsbury Rams tonight, Thursday.

Boss Ian Millward has referred to it as a ‘special game’ – one which Centurions need to win by a huge margin to maintain a chance of finishing top of the Co-operative Championship.

Leigh, who also need current leaders Featherstone Rovers to slip up at Widnes Vikings on Sunday in order to claim the League Leaders’ Shield, are guaranteed at least second place but facing Fev either home or away in the second week of the play-offs will be decided by the eventual finishing positions.

Millward’s men know plenty about second-from-bottom Dewsbury, having faced them on back-to-back weeks in league and cup in June.

Both of those previous occasions resulted in wins for Leigh – 34-6 in the league and 44-10 in the Northern Rail Cup semi finals – and the Centurions have a fair record at the Tetleys Stadium with their last loss there being a Challenge Cup tie in 2007.

“It’s a special game for us for a number of reasons,” said Millward.

“Firstly, it’s in Yorkshire and we are almost certain to be playing Featherstone in the play-offs at Featherstone after their recent results.

“Secondly, it’s against a team that is battling relegation. It will be tense and just the sort of game we need.

“Also, several players will be leaving at the end of the season so we’d like the right ending for them.

“And, after a week off, we are going to have to play tough. It would probably have been better for us to have kept playing but we did have a couple of blokes with bumps and bruises – Stuart Donlan (pictured) got a bit of a facial injury which gave him chance to recover.

“We are excited about moving to the next stage with regards playing this game. We know we have got to play with intensity and know we’ve got the play-offs to look forward to.

“We are really excited about what we’ve achieved this year so far and we want to finish it off. There have been so many positives."

Centurions also have a chance to end the league season with an unbeaten away record, having only dropped points in a 28-28 draw at Featherstone.

In that away run, Leigh have racked up 332 points and Millward reckons it would be a big achievement.

He said: “That would be tremendous. I can’t imagine any team has ever done it.”

Leigh’s under 23s played against Halifax at Leigh East last night hoping for a win to progress closer to an eventual elimination semi-final against either Widnes or Oldham. Victory will ensure another home semi-final to be played next week.

The Scholarship team finished their four games with a third win against Oldham, prevailing 20-16 after coming back from 16-4 down at half-time.

“Our under 23s side is very young and we deliberately did that,” said Millward.

“I’m really happy with the progress of them. The coaches have done a very good job and it augers well for the future.

“The inclusion of Stuart Littler and John Duffy working with the extended Scholarship has been brilliant.

“I’ve been really impressed with their attitude. They have benefited from the training they have received through me and they are also two players that people watch and respect what they do on the field.”