Giants ruin Cooke return

In-form Huddersfield ruined Paul Cooke's homecoming with a 28-16 win over Hull KR at Craven Park, handing themselves a fifth straight engage Super League win.

Although coach of the month for April Jon Sharp will be aggrieved that his side's latest success will not court the majority of the headlines, there is little denying that Cooke's debut for his boyhood club was the story of the night.

After having his controversial switch from bitter rivals Hull FC sanctioned by the RFL late on Friday afternoon, coach Justin Morgan wasted little time in slotting the stand-off into the halves alongside skipper James Webster.

After a boisterous start in which Luke Dyer wasted two good opportunities for the home side, it was the visitors who opened the scoring with a quick fire double.

First, Stuart Jones pounced after Kevin Brown's pass, before Brad Drew punched through Webster's attempted tackle to feed the onrushing Andy Raleigh for a second. Chris Thorman converted both.

Cooke's kicking game maintained Rovers' presence in the match though and, after a penalty, they opened their account in the 21st minute when Webster and Cooke combined with Ben Cockayne to send Andreas Bauer crashing over.

The new signing added a touchline goal and then a penalty to close the gap. Jason Netherton's knock-on after Cooke had regained possession from a goalline drop-out saw Huddersfield lead 12-8 at the break. Cooke almost sent Chris Chester into a gap after the restart, with his former Hull team-mate knocking on, before the latter atoned for his error with a well-executed 40-20 kick.

From the subsequent set of six, Stanley Gene - possibly the fall guy of Cooke's arrival - barged over in typically rugged fashion to level the scores. A Cooke conversion and penalty opened up a four-point lead. Thorman then chose the wrong option when seemingly through as Huddersfield, led by the excellent Drew began to comeback.

As a result, it was no surprise when Wild's try after Jon Goddard's misjudgment and Thorman's touchline goal put them back in front.

With Rovers given no choice but to force the issue, their case was not helped by the sin-binning of Mark O'Neill with nine minutes remaining for an off the ball incident. Lolesi then completed proceedings with a simple try as Rovers struggled for numbers in defence, with Thorman adding two penalties for good measure.