Salford boss Paul Rowley hailed a “special” dressing room following their 25-14 victory over Warrington at the Halliwell Jones Stadium.
Six days on from Warrington’s Challenge Cup final defeat to Wigan, Salford looked keen to capitalise on any Wolves hangover as they raced into a 19-0 lead at the break following tries from Nene Macdonald, Deon Cross and Marc Sneyd.
Warrington briefly threatened an unlikely second-half comeback with efforts from Rodrick Tai and Matty Ashton, but Cross’ second score of the match put paid to their chances before Tai crossed for a late consolation.
A whirlwind week for Salford saw director of rugby Ian Blease take a new role with Leeds and speculation of Rowley potentially following him had no negative impact on the squad who claimed a second win on the bounce.
Rowley said: “This group is pretty special.
“They got what they deserved, the lads, they worked really hard – we played with bravery, executing with good skill as well.
“We just want to keep chipping away at teams and big clubs like Warrington. We don’t get mentioned in the same breath as the bigger clubs with more resource and higher expectations as well, which is a strength of ours because there is no expectation.
“We have some decent players actually and when we have our best players on the park then we can do some good things.
“We understand Warrington came off the back of an emotional week at Wembley, we expected to face the best of them, we won’t get carried away but we are still allowed to enjoy a good win against a good team.”
Rowley also heaped praise on “talisman” Sneyd, who slotted over five kicks, including a drop goal, to go with his first-half try.
He said: “He’s just a good, humble lad enjoying his rugby, I think that shines through in him
“He’s a talisman, he’s old school, he thinks and plays ahead like all good players do and when times are stressful on the field and everybody doesn’t want the ball, he does, so to have that sort of person in your ranks, we are very lucky.”
Warrington’s defeat was their third on the trot and boss Sam Burgess admitted last weekend’s Wembley setback had played its part.
“It was a bit of a hangover yes,” he said.
“They scored three long-range tries, three breakaway tries in the space of 10 minutes which shocked us.
“I didn’t throw the book at them because I don’t think it works and it was a couple of moments, we just have to be better in the moment which comes down to doing your jobs individually. Literally three plays in the first half hurts us.
“They don’t give in at all, I love their effort, I have never questioned that. They fought until the end tonight, at 19-0 they could have easily not had a go but that’s not the case.
“We’re just in a period we have to get through which will test us but we’ve been tested before.”
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