Jimmy Lowes pulls no punches after Bradford Bulls collapse

IT WAS supposed to be the day that Bradford said farewell to Super League rugby at Odsal in style.

A club that dominated the competition in the not-too-distant past received a very healthy turn-out of 7,438 in the glorious sunshine.

The vast majority arrived hoping to see a Bradford victory to mark the end of an era and to see further signs of the recent renaissance being engineered by Jimmy Lowes.

But no sooner had the Bulls completed their traditional end-of-season lap of honour, Lowes was giving his players a serious roasting in the dressing room.

"We made too many errors," said the head coach.

"We made some great opportunities for ourselves but bombed the chances and turned the ball over too easily.

"Right from the off, there was a poor mistake from Luke Gale, which was unlike him, and they went and scored from that set.

"Our error rate was too high and unacceptable – I'm disappointed with the whole game. The second half was a result of us dropping the ball too much in the first half.

"We had opportunities to score that would have taken us away from Widnes but our poor execution and skill let us down massively."

It was damning stuff from Lowes, who insisted there were no positives whatsoever to take from the performance.

Not even the debut of 19-year-old centre Brad Adams, who embarked on an exhilarating break during the first half but failed to find a team-mate.

Lowes said: "He's a rugby player and he should have been smarter on the end of that."

His fury epitomised the fiery approach upon which the Bulls' promotion assault will be founded next season.

It was a sad way for players such as Gale, Brett Kearney, Manase Manuokafoa and James Donaldson to depart.

Chairman Marc Green and managing director Steve Ferres helped form a guard of honour for retiring club captain Matt Diskin before kick-off.

"This is a man who has been at the top for 14 years and I want to take this opportunity to tip my hat to him – a legend of the game and our club captain," Green told supporters.

Diskin looked genuinely humbled as he came onto the pitch with his children.

But Widnes were worthy winners thanks to an utterly dominant second-half display which saw them run in 24 unanswered points to qualify for the play-offs for the first time in their history.

A dominant early spell saw them breach the Bulls' line twice to establish an 8-0 lead with two tries from Paddy Flynn in the right corner.

The Vikings led inside the second minute when they worked the ball out to Flynn and he collected Danny Tickle's exquisite long pass to cross in the right corner.

The Bulls had begun sluggishly and Widnes punished them again in the eighth minute when Flynn finished clinically in the right corner.

Tickle failed to convert either try and Bradford began to establish a foothold on proceedings.

Lee Gaskell and Gale began to combine effectively and three minutes later the Bulls were off the mark.

Adam O'Brien found Gale and he offloaded neatly to Gaskell, who sent the supporting Tom Olbison over from close range.

It was a well-worked score which sent confidence pumping through the veins of Lowes' men.

They were dealt a blow moments later, however, when Gaskell went down injured and departed the field.

He returned later only to leave the action again with a knee injury, the seriousness of which is not yet clear.

That saw Donaldson introduced from the bench and Danny Addy switched from loose forward to stand-off.

The Bulls began to ask more searching questions and Widnes struggled to find the answers.

O'Brien almost darted over from acting half, Gale came close to slipping Olbison in with a neat pass and then the scrum half forced another goal-line drop-out, one of three in quick succession, with a teasing grubber kick.

Kearney, Addy and the impressive Jay Pitts then came close to sending Danny Williams over in the left corner.

Phil Joseph, who spent the 2012 campaign at Odsal, then came on for Widnes but made a clumsy handling error which gifted possession back to Bradford.

They used the field position to telling effect, marching the Vikings upfield before Chev Walker took a neat pass from Pitts to barrel over the line in the left corner.

Gale added a sublime conversion and Gaskell was soon back on to replace Addy at stand-off.

Adams made an exhilarating break down the right flank shortly before half-time but his inside pass went awry and the opportunity was spurned.

Still, it was stirring stuff from the Bulls to see one of their home-grown players advancing past seasoned Super League opponents with such page and vigour.

O'Brien, who was also pivotal in Bradford's impressive first-half display, took a knock and required treatment but was fine to continue.

The Bulls led 12-8 at the break – but they were fairly awful in the second half.

Adam Henry embarked on a surging run inside the right channel which came to nothing and moments later Widnes assumed control, scoring two tries in as many minutes from centre Stefan Marsh.

The first came in the 52nd minute when, after Adams knocked on, Widnes worked the ball into the right corner from the resulting scrum to score through Marsh.

The centre was at it again soon after as the Vikings conjured a delightful passing sequence which saw the ball go through five pairs of hands to score through Marsh again in the right corner.

Tickle failed to convert both tries, so Widnes led only 16-12 when they could have easily been more comfortable.

Marsh completed his hat-trick from a Kevin Brown pass with 11 minutes to go, although it came as little surprise and to ironic cheers when Tickle kept his unwanted 100 per cent record by missing his fifth straight conversion.

To rub salt in Bradford's wounds, former Bulls winger Patrick Ah Van grabbed a late sixth try and Lloyd White a seventh for Widnes, with Cameron Phelps converting both.

Attendance: 7,438

Bulls v Widnes picture gallery