You could say Richard Marshall paid the price for raising expectations during his time in charge at Halifax, after he surprisingly departed from The Shay outfit a week ago.

Fax, who haven’t been in the Super League since 2003, reached the Qualifiers in three of the previous four seasons under Marshall, making them the most successful part-time team in the country.

However, in a season where they hoped to be challenging promotion favourites Toronto Wolfpack and Toulouse at the top of the Betfred Championship, they have had an inconsistent first half to the campaign.

They had the high of knocking top flight side London Broncos out of the Challenge Cup, but in the league, six wins have been balanced out by six defeats to leave Halifax in mid-table.

The most recent of these came last Sunday, just after Marshall left, as they impressively won 32-24 at Yorkshire rival Sheffield Eagles, under the caretaker charge of Simon Grix.

Fax trailed 20-18 at half-time, but they produced a very good second-half display that was capped by two tries from centre Chester Butler, who had previous missed over three months with a quadriceps injury.

Ahead of his first home game in charge, Grix, who signed his older brother Scott on loan from Huddersfield Giants this week, believes he is ready to be given the job on a permanent basis.

He told the Halifax Courier: As far as my position goes, that’s a discussion we’ll have later

“Coaching has been a long-term ambition of mine and doing it at Halifax is right up there.

“I think I’m ready; I’ve been around good environments and good people for a long time.

“Until you’re in the hot seat, no one knows but we are going to speak this week and we’ll go from there.”

A trip to The Shay proved too tough for the Raiders last year, as they were defeated 30-4 in 2018’s corresponding fixture, with Gene Ormsby’s unconverted try the only time they registered.