Barrow Raiders head coach Paul Crarey wants better decision-making from his players after they allowed a few chances to slip through their fingers during the 24-16 friendly win against North Wales Crusaders.

The Raiders looked set to build on what was a healthy 18-4 half-time lead at Craven Park last Sunday, but they were unable to carry the momentum of what was a promising performance into the second half.

Joe Crarey’s try after 53 minutes was the only time they crossed the whitewash after the break and their defence creaked in the closing stages as the Crusaders pulled back a couple of tries to make the match appear closer than it actually was.

With only one pre-season friendly to go before the real action begins next month, there is still a lot for Crarey and his players to work on, with the ground still heavy, in order for them to be up to speed.

Crarey said: “We opened them up many times, but we weren’t clinical enough. We made breaks of 50 or 60 metres and from then, you’ve got to play.

“What I call ‘laying the line’ is sending somebody in and then getting them on the next play. The opportunity to play was there and we kicked the ball when we had numbers on the edge, and the kicks were around the posts, but up in the air.

“They were easy to pick out of the air and once they catch it in-goal it’s a 20-metre restart, like when Tee [Ritson] caught the ball when they kicked poorly and he was away.

“It’s difficult to defend when everybody is chasing hard on the play and then their guy receives the ball and taps with nobody in front of him and it was lucky Ryan Duffy slipped in.

“He gave away a penalty that led to them getting field position, but it probably would have been a try otherwise. You can’t judge yourselves on friendlies, but it’s the back end of sets that we need to improve on.”

Barrow won’t get the chance to do that until Workington Town travel down the coast a week on Sunday, with them having to go hard in training instead this week, due to them not being able to get a fourth friendly scheduled.

“We wanted that extra one so we could slim the squad down,” Crarey said. “We’ve got to integrate these amateur boys in and the extra friendly would have been more for our players, so we could have a couple of games where we just fielded the professional lads.

“We’ll have to have a think about that for the Workington game because then it’s a week off before the Challenge Cup and then it’s another week.

“It’s going to be difficult to get in a rhythm for our fellas, but we’re doing pretty well in terms of trying to balance the side on the field, with so many changes, but there were some real nice tries in there on Sunday mixed in with some soft defensive lapses that we need to fix pretty quickly.”