JOHN Kear saluted the Bulls for being “absolutely ruthless” as they signed off the Championship with their biggest win of the season.

The Bulls hammered Rochdale 82-0 with 12 different players running in 15 tries. Dalton Grant scored a hat-trick and Joe Keyes contributed 28 points to seal sixth spot in emphatic fashion.

“I was absolutely delighted with them,” said Kear. “I told the players at half-time that I can’t recall coaching a team who had a 100 per cent completion rate.

“They were clinical in everything that they did. Their attitude was fantastic.

“Technically, you could say there was nothing to play for. But they wanted to send their mates away with some great memories of a great performance.

“It makes it special because there are people leaving us to pastures new and we just wanted to send them off with a stellar performance. They are a very tight-knit group and do like each other genuinely not just as rugby players but people.”

The Bulls finished just one point behind Featherstone in the final play-off spot despite winning their last four games. The narrow loss at York in July saw them fall just short.

Kear added: “We wanted to finish as high as we possibly could.

"As I said to the players, the width of the post has ultimately cost us a place in the play-offs.

“One more win would have got us in. We’ve been very close but I wouldn’t have swapped that Leeds game in the Challenge Cup.

“Emotionally and physically, that took a lot out of us because we didn’t win from beating Leeds until the quarter-final. That took it out of us.

“We can learn from little things and improve and make better for next year.”

The squad will return to training this week for individual reviews before Kear looks to step up his recruitment drive for next year’s move to Dewsbury.

Chairman Andrew Chalmers hopes the Bulls will be out of special measures by the end of the month.

Kear said: “As soon as we’re out of special measures, we’ll be recruiting heavily and trying to re-sign as well the lads we’ve identified.

“There is lots of work going on that the fans won’t realise.”