LEAGUE One favourites Toronto Wolfpack kicked off their Kingstone Press campaign in style in the capital, with a 76-0 win over London Skolars on Saturday afternoon throwing down the gauntlet to second favourites Barrow Raiders to repeat the feat against York City Knights on Saturday evening.

Ex-NRL star Fuifui Moimoi scored a hat-trick for the 20/1 odds-on Wolfpack during the 13-try rout, but there was a silver lining for the Skolars as they broke their record attendance, with 1,542 rugby league fans packing into the New River Stadium, which is a positive sign for the club who struggle to get over 300 on a normal match-day.

We couldn’t score 76, but we did start the season to plan with a pretty good victory against a tough young York outfit 28-0 in front of a very poor attendance of 763. As Delia Smith would say “Where are you?”

Paul Crarey was very pleased with the defensive effort of the 6/1 second favourites and to nil any team takes a significant amount of concentration and disciplined aggression.

Leading 20-0 at half-time we were firmly in the driving seat, but I just knew that the second half was going to be more competitive and so it turned out.

In fact York played very well in the second half and had plenty of possession, primarily down to the penalties Barrow conceded and at one point the Raiders were put on a ‘team warning’ meaning the next player to concede a penalty was going to the sin bin.

Fortunately that didn’t happen and although York had plenty of tackles in the red zone, the defence was always well set and defended magnificently to run out eventual 28-0 winners.

Knights coach James Ford wasn’t happy and he said post-match: “We did not run hard enough or tackle hard enough.”

And he dismissed the youthfulness in his squad as an excuse, saying they were good enough to take the points.

Asked if Barrow were just bigger and stronger, Ford said: “I don’t buy it. Wigan aren’t the biggest but their mentality is ‘I’m going to tackle you as hard as I can’”

Although Barrow couldn’t quite get going in the second half I always felt that if the scoreline got too close, we always had the ability to go up a gear, so I think Mr Ford is a little bit delusional.

Surprising news this week was that the Knights were able to pull off a massive recruitment coup when they signed ex-Raider Andy Ellis.

Andy starred for Barrow during our 2009 Championship-winning campaign, scoring 53 tries in 94 games during three seasons with the Raiders and was highly regarded by everyone down at the club. I’m glad he wasn’t signed last week!

Tomorrow we travel down the M6 to Coventry to play Coventry Bears. The Bears haven’t won a game yet this year and we beat them 36-18 just a few weeks ago at Craven Park and last season we won 34-0 at Coventry.

Coach Tom Tsang said “Last week’s defeat v Doncaster 26-4 was heartening and Barrow will pose a similar test as they too have a lot of experience in the side.”

The bookies have given the Bears a 30-point start in the handicap and they are rarely wrong; so as long as we are professional and keep our structure and discipline we should win comfortably.

Workington Town lost their opening game at home to Newcastle Thunder last week but they should win tomorrow at Oxford, but the match of the weekend has got be Toronto’s visit to the Recreation Ground to play Whitehaven tomorrow.

Haven had a tough victory at South Wales last week but they will have to be at their very best to beat the Canadians as the bookies have given Haven a 28-point start on the handicap. Come on Haven!