Challenge Cup: Huddersfield 50-6 Hull FC - Giants comfortably win to reach quarters

Adam Swift and Tui Lolohea celebrate a Huddersfield tryImage source, Allan McKenzie/SWpix.com
Image caption,

Huddersfield winger Adam Swift (right) has now passed 150 career tries

Betfred Challenge Cup

Huddersfield (20) 50

Tries: Swift 4, Halsall 2, Naiqama 2, Murchie, Livett Goals: Lolohea 3, Connor 2

Hull FC (6) 6

Tries: Lane Goals: Charles

Adam Swift scored four tries against his old club Hull FC as Huddersfield Giants marched mercilessly into the last eight of the Challenge Cup.

The winter wing signing from Humberside stole the headlines in a 10-try demolition of former Giants boss Tony Smith's Black and Whites.

Fellow wing Sam Halsall and centre Kevin Naiqama scored twice, while Jack Murchie and Harvey Livett also crossed.

Jordan Lane got Hull's only try in the first half, converted by Jack Charles.

Hull had lost four of their first five Super League games this season - and boss Smith's pre-match message saw simply that they did not want to have 50 points put on them again, after last Saturday's 54-4 home defeat by Leigh.

Instead, they shipped 10 tries instead of nine last weekend - and were only spared a heavier defeat by the hosts' wastefulness with the boot, as they managed only five conversions.

Image source, PA Media
Image caption,

Sam Halsall scored two of Huddersfield's 10 tries. six of which came from the wings

Hull old boy Jake Connor landed only two before going off with a tweaked hamstring, although Tui Lolohea was more successful with three when he took over kicking duties.

But victory came at a cost for Watson, who also lost prop Ollie Wilson with an arm injury and has confirmed that fellow prop Chris Hill must undergo surgery.

The Giants led 20-6 at the break after a brace of tries from Halsall and Swift before Lane responded for Hull, only for the hosts to score twice more though Naiqama and Murchie - after Ligi Sao's yellow card for a swinging arm.

When Huddersfield then stepped it up after the break, the visitors capitulated.

Having reached the career landmark of 150 tries (86 of them in Super League for St Helens and 36 for Hull) with his first try for Huddersfield, Swift led the way with his second-half hat-trick.

That leaves the vastly experienced Smith with a lot on his plate going into the Good Friday Super League derby date with another of his former clubs, Hull KR, in six days' time.

Huddersfield coach Ian Watson:

"The two ties that Adam Swift scored in the first half we wouldn't have scored last year.

"He's a different level at getting in that space. He can score out of nothing.

"We worked really hard for each other and that reflected in the outcome.

"We know Hull like to play hot, they like to offload and make you move. But they are in their infancy of what Tony is trying to do, knowing how he builds his teams."

Hull FC coach Tony Smith told BBC Radio Humberside:

"It wasn't good enough. We got off to a poor start, then fought our way back in for a while.

"But we missed too many tackles and didn't have the intensity to put the opposition under enough pressure.

"When you let teams off the hook too easily, it hurts you. And it's not a good feeling.

"You get sick of the taste it leaves in your mouth after games like that, but the only people who can do anything about it is ourselves."

Huddersfield: Connor; Swift, Marsters, Naiqama, Halsall; Lolohea, Clune; English, Milner, Wilson, Murchie, Livett, Cudjoe.

Interchanges: Golding, Greenwood, Rushton, Ikahihifo.

Hull: Hoy; Martin, McIntosh, Sutcliffe, Tindall; Charles, Smith; Ese'ese, F Brown, Sao, Scott, Staveley, Lane.

Interchanges: J Brown, Gardiner, Houghton, Okunbor.

Referee: Aaron Moore.

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