Rotherham Titans have named their strongest squad possible to take on Preston Grasshoppers in their final home game of the season in Nat 2 North; kick-off at Clifton Lane on Saturday is 2pm.
Following the Easter break Rotherham are keen to get back onto the park and finish off their home campaign with a performance that will hopefully translate into a win.
Indeed, if Roth are able to secure a victory it would be the first time this term they have managed to string four consecutive wins together, which in turn would give everyone at the club reasons to be optimistic going into next season.
However, Grasshoppers will aim to ensure that does not happen and following their win over Rotherham at Lightfoot Green Lane earlier in the season, they will be confident of a similar result this time around.
Additionally, the North West side’s form of late has been very encouraging having won four of their last seven outings, including wins against Tynedale and Otley.
Whereas their three reversals were away to sides in the top 5 in the division, Chester, Hull Ionians and Fylde, but notably the defeats were all by 6-points or less.
Going into the game Roth have made four changes to the starting XV that beat Chester, with 3 of those coming in the backline.
Sam Veall comes in at scrum half for Kai Ramrattan, Luckas Sableman-Blue comes in on the wing as Jack Taylor moves to full back and Lloyd Hayes to fly half for the missing Joe Carlisle and Callum Bustin comes into the centres for Tomasi Tanumi.
The one change in the pack sees Lewis Allan come into the back row for the injured Rupert Kay.
Speaking ahead of the match Titans head coach, Gary Pearce said:
“It was very pleasing to for us to get the win at Chester; they’ve proved all year that Hare Lane is a difficult place to go. They’re an excellent home side and the lads had to put in a good all round performance to get the win. We scored some lovely tries, our forwards fronted up really well, our backs looked sharp and put in a great shift and I thought we looked as if we really wanted it.
“I thought we looked a decent side for much of the match and to get any away win in this league means collectively you have played pretty well.
“We want to try and finish off the season well because we want to give our supporters a little bit of something to look forward to next year and we want to try and keep our current run of form going until the end of the season.
“The lads are the lucky ones because they get to play and if you love the game that’s what it’s all about. You have to have the enthusiasm to play and the desire to win games of rugby. If you don’t have that and the other team does, then they win, it’s as simple as that.
“It will be the same against Preston; we need to have the same enthusiasm and desire to win, because they have shown with their recent results what a good side they are. They play on an artificial surface at home and that means they will be comfortable with ball in hand and they’ll look to attack us with tempo when they can.
“However, we are the home side and our form at Clifton Lane has been pretty good and we are getting better with how we want to play our game and as this is our final home game of the year, we would love nothing more than to round it off with a win.”
Titans: 15 Jack Taylor, 14 Jack Hedley, 13 Harry Dunne, 12 Callum Bustin, 11 Luckas Sableman-Blue, 10 Lloyd Hayes, 9 Sam Veall, 1 Charlie Capps, 2 Jack Bergmanas, 3 Danny Rylance, 4 Matt Challinor, 5 Theo Nwosu-Hope, 6 Lewis Allan, 7 Marcus Payne, 8 Zak Poole (Capt.).
Replacements: 16 Aydan Godden, 17 Alastair Donkor, 18 Gareth Denman, 19 Cade Cambier, 20 George Tucker.
