By Chloe Horswill
With just over a week to go until the new Super League season, Hull FC face Doncaster RLFC in their final warm up game of the pre-season.
Hull have had a tough pre-season so far having only won one of their four games, which included a heavy defeat to local rivals Hull KR.
Their last game was ultimately lost in the first half after a number of costly penalties took Salford Red Devils out of their reach, despite a revived second half performance.
Despite this, vice-captain Danny Houghton believes that the team will go into the new season stronger on the back of their Challenge Cup win at Wembley.
Hooker @mint250988 recons #HullFC will be stronger in 2017 than 2016 when they won the cup: Listen to him here https://t.co/JC9VaHVCgy
— BBC Humberside Sport (@HumbersideSport) February 2, 2017
Hull have Chris Green and Josh Bowen available as well as captain Gareth Ellis could make his first appearance of pre-season after missing the rest of the games with a minor back problem.
Manager Lee Radford believes that although he has been suffering through injury, it isn’t going to cause a problem going into the season.
He told the Hull Daily Mail: “If there is any doubt there is no point risking him. He went into the 2016 season without playing any friendlies after his Achilles operation the following year, so it’s not any different and we wouldn’t be worried about it.”
Doncaster will prove to be tough opponents for the Super League side after enjoying a stunning comeback against Leeds Rhinos that saw them win the game 35-34 in the last minute.
Following on from other good results in pre-season, the new second-rower Charlie Martin is looking forward to the test of another Super League team.
He told the club website: “There’s no such thing as a friendly anymore. Every game is a must win and we have to treat them all as if there’s two points at stake. We’ll be leaving everything out there on the pitch.”