Barrow Raiders head coach Paul Crarey was delighted with the contribution of back row Dan Toal off the bench during last Sunday’s victory over London Skolars in the Coral Challenge Cup.

Toal injected some extra power into the Raiders’ game after initially coming on during the first half, with the hosts never losing the lead that came about when he barged his way through a couple of tackles before setting up Danny Morrow for the first of his two tries.

Like so many other players at Craven Park, Toal missed a lot of rugby last year, with a knee injury restricting him to just 14 appearances and only three of those coming after the end of June.

However, he displayed in the 38-18 win against the Skolars why Crarey was so keen to keep the Ulverston product at the club for a ninth season.

Crarey said: “He’s a great player, Danny, because he’s so tough and he gives us so much energy.

“He’s got a really good recovery rate, he carries the ball and when he makes consecutive tackles he looks as though he’s tired and then he springs up and does something brilliant.

“I thought he carried the ball strongly, he defended well and I thought all our middles were good.

“We probably weren’t that great at the back end of sets, but it was very difficult to kick the ball well - they ended up kicking out of dummy half with [Neil] Thorman more than their halves, so that’s how had it got for both sides.

“You’re sat there and you’re watching thinking ‘can we kick the ball better,’ but the conditions were so horrendous, with the wind and the cold and at the end there was a blizzard. I just want to thank every supporter that turned up in those conditions.”