Doncaster Knights turn attention to B&I Cup

Having secured themselves a shot at the Premiership, Doncaster Knights turn their attention to the British & Irish Cup again this weekend.
Clive GriffithsClive Griffiths
Clive Griffiths

They travel to Cornish Pirates on Sunday in the quarter-finals.

“The main aim at the start of the season was doing well in the Championship and given our recruitment in the summer we always felt that we could do that,” said director of rugby Clive Griffiths ahead of the game at the Mennaye Field.

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“Having made sure of our top four place at the weekend it has given us a different focus when it comes to the B&I Cup.

“There will be changes but we’ll be taking a strong team down there with the objective of reaching the semi-finals and hopefully going even further.

“With nothing to play for in the league, Pirates will see the B&I Cup as not only giving them the chance to save their season, but also picking up some prize money, and they’ll be giving it their best shot without a doubt.

“Hopefully it will be a dry track down there, as it was when we beat them in the league.

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“We don’t want to be playing on a heavy pitch if we can help it, though we’ve shown we can adapt to any conditions this season.

“After being our bogey side for several seasons we’ve won the last four games against them and that will obviously give us confidence.”

He added: “Obviously with us only having played each other at the end of last month both teams will be familiar with how the other one plays but we’ve tried to tweak a couple of things in training this week.

“One of the moves we worked on ahead of the London Scottish game helped us pick up seven points so hopefully we can do something similar down there.

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“We both know how the other team plays but it is one thing knowing what the opposition is going to do and it’s another trying to stop them.

“If you can keep possession for something like 20 phases, as we did in the build-up to one of our tries against Scottish, then no one can stop you. They know they are going to have to tackle consistently well for 80 minutes if they hope to be in with a chance.”