Thunder are on revenge mission

Jun 14 2008 by Mark Douglas, The Journal

GATESHEAD Thunder head coach Dave Woods hopes to take advantage of Doncaster’s midweek Northern Rail Cup exertions as they look to extend their advantage at the top of National League Two.

In-form Thunder have put together a record-breaking run of wins as part of their surge to the top of the division, and their form has been so impressive that Woods now believes that promotion rather than the play-offs should be the club’s minimum aim.

Defeating Doncaster would represent welcome revenge for Woods’ men, who were dumped out of the Cup by the Dons.

With Doncaster having been pushed hard before beating Batley 21-12 on Thursday , there would not appear to be a better time to meet Ellery Hanley’s men – and head coach Woods admits his team will be looking to exploit any possible weariness in the opposition.

“I don’t want to go overboard but it may be able to help us. We were in a similar situation a few weeks ago where we played two games in a week and of course it does put demands on your players,” he said.

“But we managed to get through it and win both of our games so we can’t take it for granted that we’ll just turn up and they’ll roll over, because that is not going to happen.”

Seven wins in a row have confirmed Thunder’s position as the team to beat in National League Two, and while Woods is refusing to get carried away by their run of form, he believes they have now set a standard to aspire to.

And if they can keep that up, promotion is very much on the agenda at the International Stadium.

“The end of the season is still a long way off but of course we’re happy with how things are going,” he said.

“At the start of the year we said we wanted to just make the (play-off) semi-finals but since we have started so well we’re now saying we want promotion.”

Doncaster have already proved their pedigree to Thunder once this season in a bruising Cup encounter earlier in the season, and Woods envisages another tough match.

“They have guys who’ve played Super League and a coach in Ellery Hanley who has achieved loads in the game, so we’re going to have to be at it from the start,” he said.

Thunder have doubts over the fitness of Danny Wilson and Dylan Nash but hope that both will recover in time for the trip to South Yorkshire.