Hull KR are hopeful that James Batchelor’s absence will not be a long one after missing Friday’s win over Wakefield Trinity. The back-rower missed the clash against his former club due to a throat injury suffered in Rovers’ clash with Castleford Tigers last time out.
During his midweek press conference, Willie Peters had expressed fears that Batchelor could miss up to six weeks ahead of a consultation with specialists. Alas, Batchelor did not feature this week and is set to miss further games.
But the good news is that the timeframe of his return has now been shortened, or at least that is the hope, with the new hope being that he will one miss two more games.
“He’s probably another couple of weeks,” Peters said. “He still hasn’t got his voice back fully yet, so that needs to come back because we don’t want to take any risk.
“If he gets another knock there he might sound like our mate Shaun Kenny-Dowall. That’s what he’s saying he doesn’t want to do! He needs to get that right first. So hopefully another two weeks.”
Rovers were boosted by the return of fellow back-rower Rhyse Martin, who was back after recovering from a quad injury that came with a four-month lay-off.
“ I thought he did a reasonable job first game back,” Peters said. “He’s had a lot of time off. We brought Rhyse over to play so that’s why we put him straight back in.
“Kelepi, he’s done a great job as well coming off the bench. But that’s what we want. We want a squad. We want players that come in and it doesn’t look too different and I don’t think it looked too different tonight.”