JORDAN Lilley is loving life at the Bulls and wants to help the club return to Super League.

It is now three years since the Bulls last played in the top-flight and on-loan Lilley has fond memories of local derbies against his parent club Leeds Rhinos.

Yet born and bred in Leeds, and still keen to play first-team rugby at Headingley, he is feeling no sense of divided loyalty about his time at the Provident Stadium.

Having extended his loan for a second month, Lilley produced his best display in a Bulls shirt last weekend against Dewsbury Rams.

Linking up with Joe Keyes at half-back, the 20-year-old helped orchestrate a 56-18 victory that fuelled a belief that the Bulls will pull away from the Championship relegation zone.

The deduction of 12 points makes a promotion push unlikely but Lilley says the club can still get back on the road to Super League this season.

"It's weird to think that I am a Leeds player and a Leeds fan and I am now at Bradford, the rival club – but we wouldn't want to see Bradford to go down," he said.

"It was sad to see them go down into the Championship and not have that rivalry out there with 20,000 people at Odsal watching.

"That's what we want back now and I am going to do my all for Bradford while I am here to get us onto zero points and then start pushing up the league."

With four wins from the last five games, the Bulls are now on minus four points as they prepare for Sunday's trip to struggling Oldham.

Lilley said: "Hopefully, we can get somewhere near this year. It's going to be tough and we are going to have to work hard but this is a really strong-minded group of players.

"After all the adversity they have been through, they have come out of the other side the better for it. They are working hard in training to push up that ladder – and essentially stay in this league this year – but then hopefully next year we can push for Super League."

Having joined the Bulls on the eve of the season, Lilley was recalled by Leeds for a Super League game at Castleford Tigers on March 5. He missed a total of three matches before returning for the Bulls last weekend.

With captain Leon Pryce unavailable due to illness, Lilley and Keyes were thrown together at half-back and the pair spent extra time on the training ground in the build-up to the game.

"We were meant to play together against London Broncos but I got called back to play for Leeds so it didn't happen," he reflected.

"Prycey had not been too well so me and Keyesy worked hard, stopped after training and worked on the extra little bits that we needed to get the partnership there.

"He's a really good lad. We get on and we have clicked. When we do play, we play some good stuff.

"It was the first time we had played together against Dewsbury and we were probably rusty in patches in the first half. The knock-ons in the first half absolutely killed us.

"We were constantly on the back foot so, when we did get into the positions to attack, we were tired and couldn't put the players on because the forwards had just defended four sets.

"Those little things stopped in the second half and the forwards were outstanding. That made the job easier.

"When we had the pack going forward, I thought we played very well together. All I had to do then was the 'decision-making' part of the game, which is one of my strengths."

Lilley feels his game will only improve under the guidance of Bulls coach Geoff Toovey, who is around the club but still not 'officially' in charge due to complications with the necessary paperwork.

Toovey, who won 13 caps for Australia, was also a half-back and is ideally positioned to offer Lilley advice.

"He has constantly been telling me what he thinks I need to do, how I can do it, and showing me little ways to do it," said Lilley.

"It's just the little subtleties in my game, where I have not quite been there or where I have been playing too lateral, or not engaging defenders, or just picking out defenders to play at and putting the plays on them.

"It may sound easy to people but, coming from someone of his calibre, it's something I take on board."