Heath L’Estrange knows the Bulls must act now to avoid a repeat of last year’s Hull heartbreak.

Bradford cruelly missed out on a place in last season’s play-offs by a single point after a five-game winning run at the tail end of the campaign proved too little, too late.

Their final day triumph at the KC Stadium proved insignificant when Catalans Dragons claimed a shock win at St Helens and pipped them to eighth spot.

Although not a part of that team, winter signing L’Estrange understands the pain felt by his team-mates and is keen to avoid a case of history repeating itself.

Hull FC are the opponents once more on Sunday (3pm) and, rather than looking to seal a five-game winning run, the Bulls are hoping to end a five-game Super League losing streak.

And L’Estrange believes the clash is every bit as important as last year’s drama-filled final fixture if Bradford are to continue defending a spot in the top eight, not end up chasing one.

He said: “We’ve got eight games to go and we need to start putting some games together now or else we’ll leave it too late, like the Bulls did last year.

“Last year it all came down to the final game and we don’t want it to come to that again.

“The last few games we want to have a place in the finals booked. We have to start looking after each other now.

“We’re confident the side we have out there can win games despite the injuries and, no disrespect to Cas, we felt we should have won last week.

“It’s just the way the day went, there are no excuses. We have to put in the work.”

Last week’s defeat at Castleford was the sixth in all competitions and L’Estrange admits the Bulls expected too much of their returning leaders.

Skipper Andy Lynch and deputy Jamie Langley came back from long injury lay-offs last week, but another substandard team performance only continued recent woes.

An emphasis on team-building in training has helped pick morale off the floor and L’Estrange is calling on everyone to lead from the front.

“All the boys are awesome, it’s a good group,” said the Aussie hooker.

“We’ve got a few more boys back now but we probably relied a little bit too much on them last week and didn’t step up enough ourselves. They stepped up but we didn’t.

“This week, we’re all back together, we’ve had a game under our belts and we’re ready to work together.

“It can be hard when you’re losing but if you have the right kind of blokes around you it’s a lot easier.

“We know what we’ve done wrong, we’ve had a talk about it and we’ve done a lot of team-building stuff this week to share the love round the boys.”

As one of the Bulls’ key pivots, L’Estrange particularly feels the weight of expectation on himself.

The season-ending shoulder injury suffered by Matt Orford has forced a re-shuffle in the halves and 18-year-old Cain Southernwood has started the past two games alongside Paul Sykes.

But L’Estrange remains ready to chip in when required and provide a touch more experience at scrum half.

He said: “Whatever happens, it has to happen. Ox has had his surgery now and he just has to rehab, while Caino’s still coming along.

“He’s coming along well for a young bloke but it’s hard for an 18-year-old to come and try and take control of a Super League team. It’s massive on his shoulders.

“So that’s why ‘Syko’ and I and some of the other boys have to help take the pressure off him and allow him to just run around and do what he does.”