IT was a script straight out of Hollywood on Friday night, as Tom Holmes stormed the length of the field to score a stunning try against Dewsbury, less than five months after returning to rugby league following cancer treatment.

That score was the highlight of a 54-0 win which keeps Bradford Bulls’ hopes of finishing second, and booking a guaranteed home play-off semi-final, in the Betfred Championship very much alive.

Holmes told the T&A after the game: “It’s been a while since I had a run like that, probably the last one was when I scored for Cas at Magic Weekend in Newcastle.

“I was feeling it after 20 metres and Gasky (Lee Gaskell) told me afterwards that’s where he’d have had to stop running.

“I enjoyed the moment and it was good to get a try, but the more important thing was getting the win and the points."

And a delighted Holmes added: “It’s amazing that I’ve got back playing and sometimes I pinch myself that I get to take the field every week.

“I’m pretty proud of the fact I’ve not missed a game since I came back in April.

“The body’s feeling it a bit, as I didn’t have a pre-season and I’ve more or less been chucked straight back into it.

“I’m loving every minute, even if I still feel a bit rusty.

“It’s good to be playing and I like these Friday night games, as you get the weekend off.

“It’s always a good atmosphere under the lights, so I’m hoping we can get a few more Friday nights, with a decent crowd in like tonight."

Bulls have been guilty of relying too heavily on the likes of Holmes and Kieran Gill to get their tries in the last couple of seasons, but there were seven different scorers on Friday, with the burden generally being shared better this year.

Holmes said: “I bet if you looked at our try-scorers list for this season, you’d find most of them have come from our middles.

“We saw big Frank (Pele) score two tonight, then Kev (Appo) got one at the end, and I myself haven’t actually scored that many this year.

“Our forwards are doing a great job and the way they’re carrying the ball gives us a threat all over the field.

“It’s not all about tries but if our middles can keep crashing over, we’ll take that all day.”

Powerful prop Franklin Pele blasts over the line to score the first of his two tries against Dewsbury on Friday night.Powerful prop Franklin Pele blasts over the line to score the first of his two tries against Dewsbury on Friday night. (Image: Tom Pearson.)

The same again would do nicely in a potentially-pivotal league game at fourth-placed Sheffield this Sunday.

Holmes said: “It’s a massive game.

“You do take a look at the table at this stage of the season, and the teams around you, and it’s pretty tight up there.

“We can only take it one game at a time, and obviously this one is against Sheffield, where I played earlier in my career and where I have some really good friends.

“We had a really good victory there at the end of last season with that late drop goal and we know this is going to be another tough game.

“It’s good that we’ve played Dewsbury on a Friday, because it gives us a bit of time to recover and we’ll look forward to Sheffield.

“Every game is effectively a play-off game now, so we’re raring to go for next week.”