? It will be an emotional afternoon, says Iestyn Harris
? Bid to relaunch club next season gathering momentum
As wakes go, the Crusaders' last home Super League match on Sunday is promising to be a surprisingly uplifting occasion. The shock of the withdrawal of their application for a licence to play in the Super League beyond the end of this season has faded, the team have responded by recording consecutive victories for the first time this year to climb off the bottom of the table, and a bid to relaunch a new club based in north Wales, in the Championship, has gathered impressive momentum.
The players, most of whom have attracted interest from other clubs for next year, shared a barbecue with the fans behind the Save the Cru campaign this week, and far from the initial suggestions that the supporters would leave Wrexham in a wave of apathy, club officials are now cautiously hopeful of one of their biggest gates of the season for the visit of Hull.
"It will be an emotional afternoon for everyone involved with the club," said Iestyn Harris, who is expected to revert to an assistant-coaching role at Wigan next season after a turbulent debut year as a head coach. "The last few weeks have been very difficult for everyone but I must heap praise on the players and the coaching staff for how they have handled everything that has been thrown at them.
"They picked themselves up with a very good performance against Wakefield and then put in an exceptional performance against Harlequins. We wanted to get off the bottom and it was pleasing to do that with a convincing win against Quins."
That result was achieved by a team including five of the young Welsh players whose development has undoubtedly been accelerated by the Crusaders' accident-prone three years in the Super League, during which six of the antipodeans who dominated their early line-ups were deported because of visa irregularities, and a first financial crisis forced the club to scuttle north from their original base in Bridgend.
In his role as coach of the Wales national team, Harris is anxious that those young players stay in the game, whether with a new Crusaders club, the Neath-based South Wales Scorpions who conclude their second season in Championship One at Oldham , or, ideally, with another Super League team.
Lloyd White, a 22-year-old hooker from Cardiff, has signed for Widnes, and the props Gil Dudson and Ben Flower are also in demand ? Flower even attracting interest from South Sydney.
However, Hull will provide tough and motivated opposition. Even after a 40-8 home win against Catalan Dragons last Friday, one of their best results of the season, they remain a point ahead of Hull KR in the eighth and last play-off position.
They are also eager to make amends for a sloppy 18-16 defeat on their only previous trip to the Racecourse, during February 2010 in front of a 6,794 crowd for the Crusaders' second home game in north Wales. The optimism that then surrounded the club may have turned out to be misguided, built as it was on such flimsy financial foundations, but at least they are going out with a bit of a bang.
Sean Long, the former Great Britain scrum-half who recently announced his retirement after suffering a series of injuries in the past two seasons with Hull, has confirmed that he will make his first move into coaching next season, with Salford as an assistant to Matt Parish.
"Sean is a winner and he will bring that winning ability to the club," Parish said. "We are fortunate to have been able to attract him. I have met him several times and his knowledge of the game is immense. I have enjoyed talking footy with him and look forward to him joining our team."
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/aug/19/crusaders-hull-finale-salford-widnes
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