The Red Devils were defeated by the Wakefield Wildcats on Saturday, who continued their Easter weekend success and added a third consecutive win to their haul.
Wakefield were able to score twice in the opening ten minutes on the back of errors by the Salford side. Jacob Miller spotting a gap in the defence first and then a powerful break through the line by Captain Danny Kirmond with an offload to Sio to score. Liam Finn successfully converted both tries.
The Wildcats were dominant in the opening part of the game but an error by former Red Devil Ben Jones-Bishop 10m from their own line gifted Salford the position for Gareth O’Brien to score.
For twenty minutes, neither side were able to score despite numerous errors by both teams. Until O’Brien found the end of a Dobson offload to link with Matt Sarsfield to score. O’Brien successfully kicked his second conversion to level the scores.
Another error by the Red Devils, this time by Murdoch-Masila gave Wakefield the ball possession metres from the try line. Tom Johnstone scored his first try of the game, as he beat Josh Griffin to a Jacob Miller high kick in the corner. Liam Finn missed the conversion but Wakefield took the lead once again at half time as the score sat at 16-12 in favour of the home side.
The Red Devils had shown real spirit to come back from 12-0 down in the first half and there was a real chance to lessen the gap between the sides but Wakefield were first to score in the second half as Tom Johnstone crossed for his second of the game in the left corner, Finn converted.
Salford responded well as Justin Carney scored on the right, with Dobson converting to take the points difference to just 4 once again. Niall Evalds had a real chance as he broke down the right wing and was tackled 20m out but the Red Devils couldn’t capitalise on the position. Junior Sa’u made a fantastic break down the left wing but dropped the ball just short of the line which proved somewhat pivotal for the visitors. Wakefield responded to the near miss, as Reece Lyne caught the Red Devils defence unaware with a great dummy to score before Tom Johnstone completed his hat trick to take the final score to 32-18.
Salford: O’Brien, Carney, Sau, Jones, J. Griffin, Wood, Dobson, Kopczak, Tomkins, G. Griffin, Murdoch, Sarsfield, Flanagan.
Replacements: Evalds, A. Walne, J. Walne, Forster.
Tries: O’Brien, Sarsfield, Carney
Goals: Dobson, O’Brien (2)
