Fev coach Cooke says players must embrace pressure

Featherstone captain Danny Addy is looking to lead his Rovers to a second 1895 Cup win, while York counterpart Liam Harris is hoping to help his side to a first victory

Featherstone Rovers head coach Paul Cooke has said his players must "embrace" the pressure of playing York Knights in the final of the 1895 Cup on Saturday.

The Championship sides meet at Wembley at 17:45 BST after the women's and men's Challenge Cup finals.

Fev are looking to win the competition, which is for second and third tier teams and was first played in 2019, for a second time while the Knights are targeting a first victory.

"This is an exciting week for everybody. There's lots of people in the Featherstone community that this means a great deal to and the players carry that on their shoulders as well and I think that is a privilege and an honour," Cooke told BBC Radio Leeds.

"This will be the biggest game in the careers of some of these players to date. This may be the last opportunity some of them have to play in this iconic stadium and influence a big game.

"If you play occasions like this down you are just saying the things people expect you to say.

"This is going to be highly pressured, highly competitive and the best players play in that and embrace it."

Cooke, who won the Challenge Cup as a player with Hull FC in 2005, took over the West Yorkshire side at the end of February after James Ford was sacked just two games into the season.

Rovers are four places below the Mark Applegarth's Knights in the table and Cooke believes that "outside the box thinking" will be key to victory.

"We've got to come up with something better and something that York wont expect," he said.

"Both teams know each other really, really well so there's going to have to be some outside the box thinking.

"They're off the back of seven wins having lost against us last. It's two very good teams, that's for sure.

"We've got a lot on with them but they've got a lot on with us."

Harris hopes Knights can use Cup as springboard

Knights winger and skipper Liam Harris wants his side to use Saturday's final to showcase their top tier credentials.

York have never played in Super League and were ranked 15th in the IMG gradings, used to decide which teams should make up the game's 12-team premier division, last year.

"Outside looking in, people probably turn their nose up at this competition," Harris told BBC Radio York.

"It is played after the [main] game and all the fans have left and all that sort of stuff, but to us, looking at it internally, it is the only knockout competition we can win so to us it's everything.

"That is what is on offer and we'll go for it. If and when we get the job done on the weekend it is a fair step in a positive direction for the club, and that's very important to us as well.

"I believe York is a Super League club in the making and it's only a matter of time [before we become one]."