After delivering a “blueprint” of how to lose, Sam Tomkins says Catalans Dragons must get back in the black on Saturday.
The England captain leads them against champions St Helens in Perpignan. And they owe Dragons fans a performance after Sunday’s shocking golden-point defeat at Castleford. Steve McNamara’s error-ridden side gaffed more times than Nadine Dorries and certainly fluffed their drop-goal attempts. After throwing away a winning position in the 17-16 defeat, with Tomkins himself bombing a chance over the line and missing a simple conversion attempt, he admitted: “It just wasn’t good enough.
“It was really frustrating. We gave ourselves a blueprint on how to lose a game. We really undersold ourselves. We did a hell of a lot wrong and set ourselves up for that finish. We’ve had a few performances that have dipped and every now and again you accept a bad game but that one was really below par.”
Last season’s League Leaders Catalans have slipped to fourth as they prepare for a rematch of last year’s Grand Final. Current frontrunners Saints are in great shape and full-back Tomkins knows his side can ill-afford a repeat showing. But facing the champions could be the best thing for them to raise their game. Tomkins, 33, said: “Whoever you play you’d put a positive spin on it.
“If we were playing Cas again we’d say that was perfect, if it was Toulouse we’d say that was, too. Whoever it is you have to improve in your own performance and that's what we’re doing this week. We’re playing the best team and we know to win we have to be at our very best. That’s what we’re going to do. It’s made it a little more difficult with missing a few guys but that’s par for the course at this stage of the season. No one has a fully fit squad.”
Catalans are without England duo Mike McMeeken and Tom Davies after they suffered injuries at Castleford. And Saints have already beaten the French side twice this year.
Tomkins, who made his 250th Super League appearance last week, said: “They beat us in the Grand Final, they beat us in the first game of the year and they knocked us out of the Challenge Cup here so we’re probably due a win.
“They’ve beaten us the last few times which isn’t ideal but we know the areas we need to improve and Saints aren’t unbeatable. They’re a very, very good team but we need to play our absolute best and try to exploit any areas of weakness they do have.”
