NORTH WALES CRUSADERS coach Anthony Murray believes his side’s first league victory has ‘set the standard’ for the season ahead.

The Wrexham club stormed to an emphatic 70-8 Good Friday victory over West Wales Raiders to collect their first points of the League One campaign.

After a series of encouraging near misses in their previous four games, the Cru ran riot against their West Wales counterparts - crossing for 11 tries in a dominant display.

Now Murray has challenged his players to replicate those performance levels across the remainder of the season, starting at Doncaster on Sunday.

“I was so impressed by how we took West West Wales apart”, Murray said.

“It was a complete team performance and it was really pleasing to see the hard work we’d put into improving elements of our game pay off.

“West Wales have improved a lot in the last year, so for us to inflict their heaviest defeat of the season was a great result for us.

“Defensively we were strong, we completed our sets at a high rate and our kicking game was good.

“We’d seen big performances from the players go unrewarded - like in the Oldham game. But against West Wales, I felt like we set the standard in terms of the levels I expect from these players.

“It was a performance I always knew they were capable of and they proved it. Confidence and momentum are vital in any sport, and I think we’d lacked that after some of the defeats we’d suffered early in the season.

“But hopefully there’s much more confidence there now and a positive mood to take into the Doncaster game.”

Currently sixth in the table, Doncaster head into this weekend’s clash looking to bounce back from a 26-18 reverse at Keighley last time out.

Murray feels the Yorkshire club have made positive strides in bolstering their squad with new additions and expects them to be challenging near the summit this term.

He added: “We know the Doncaster game will be a totally different animal to the West Wales one.

“They’ll test us in many different areas and with their physicality and the attacking formations they use.

“As a club I think they’ve made their intentions clear in the last few months and with the calibre of players they’ve recruited you’d expect them to end up among the top three in this division.

“We know it’s a huge challenge to go there and win, but we’re looking forward to it and we’ll look to play with the same positivity and drive we showed last weekend.”

Half-back Ryan Smith and full-back Tommy Johnson both remain sidelined with injury for the Cru, though centre Matt Reid is back in contention after missing the Raiders game.

Papua New Guinea international Watson Boas could make his first start for the hosts after the half-back completed a loan move from Featherstone Rovers this week.

West Wales will look to record their first win of the season today at home to Oldham.

Tomorrow’s games see London Skolars visit pacesetters Hunslet, Keighley entertain Workington, and Newcastle Thunder travel to second-placed Whitehaven.