GEOFF Toovey watched his Bulls side blown away by a Batley points blitz and admitted: "The players have let themselves down."

Having won two games in a row in the Championship Shield, they crashed back to earth at Odsal yesterday with a 44-18 defeat.

The Bulls led 12-0 early on through tries from Sam Hallas and Liam Kirk but were floored by a Batley blitz that produced 44 unopposed points in the space of 26 minutes.

Iliess Macani scored right at the end but many in the 2,609 crowd – the lowest of the season – had already gone by then.

Toovey said: "It was really disappointing, It's that time of the year when the players have got to try and stay up for themselves, the club and the fans and I think they let themselves down a bit today.

"They are aware of it – I've made them aware of it after the game. There were just very simple errors and mistakes. It was not a great display.

"It was a good start, although I thought they were a couple of soft tries and I don't think their coach would have been too happy with that.

"But we were in front 12-0 and then fell back into the old pattern where we make a mistake, try, mistake, penalty, try, kick-off, mistake, penalty, try. That's what we do – (concede) soft tries."

Damian Sironen was forced off early when he damaged his neck but Toovey felt the influential Australian forward's absence was not the key factor as the Bulls fell away to a demoralising loss.

Toovey said: "That affected the team's confidence a little bit. He had a neck issue and it stiffened right up. He couldn't go back on for safety concerns.

"Strange things do happen here but it doesn't make people drop the ball, that's for sure."

Toovey, who said he had "no idea" about Colton Roche's proposed move to Huddersfield Giants at the end of the season, knows it will be tough to pick the players up for the final three games.

"That's the difficult thing, as you can imagine – but it's a very similar line to last week," he said.

"It's about your own pride and dignity and playing as a team. I thought we did that last week (against Swinton) and I was very impressed.

"But this week it left us, both as a team and as individuals. They didn't have that energy and enthusiasm we had the week before.

"It's a difficult position. I've never been in it before where it looks like the club's getting relegated and contracts are up for grabs.

"As a player, I'd imagine that would be terribly hard to deal with. At the same time, as we've said, they are playing for their futures.

"I wouldn't single out individual players but there were a couple who had pretty good games. But they were let down by the majority.

"A couple were busting their guts but unfortunately it's a team sport and you need the 13 on the field to be doing the same thing. I don't think we did that at all."

Batley coach Matt Diskin, the former Odsal number two and academy head, said: "I thought for the first 20 minutes and the last we were scrappy. But in the middle 40 we were really good.

"We turned Bradford around and forced them into their own end and played some really clinical stuff with the ball.

"We knew if we hit the right lines and squared the right numbers up, we would get opportunities, and we did that really well."