Last Sunday's shock defeat at York City Knights put the cat among Leigh's Cup pigeons and only a victory over Rovers will keep up hopes of a Final appearance and the all-important qualification for a Super League application alive.

Ian Millward has brought in Jacob Emmett, a front row forward from St Helens and Matty Blythe, a centre from Warrington Wolves.

Under the scheme both are eligible to play in the Championship but can be recalled by their club at any time.

But it is going to be one heck of a tough task against a side held to an 18-18 draw at home by Sheffield last Sunday, and which has a game in hand on Leigh as their opening day game at Hunslet Hawks was postponed through bad weather.

Leigh, of course beat Oldham and did pick up a bonus point after last Sunday's dreadfully disappointing display, but they cannot afford to drop any more points, either against Featherstone or at Dewsbury the following week.

"It was a hugely disappointing defeat on the back of a dreadful performance," said Centurions coach Ian Millward,

"Our completion rate was just 45 per cent in the first half and only slightly more in the second.

"When you consider that you need to hit 75 per cent to have a chance of winning you can see why we didn't.

"But having said that, we created more than enough chances to have won the game a dozen times.

"It was our handling that was appalling.

"We just didn't respect the ball and when you do that you are in trouble.

"Sadly, it was some of our more experienced players who seemed to have the biggest difficulty with the ball in hand. But it is something we can work on and will work on to get it right for next week.

"Defensively we should have stopped their first try and the second came off a kick, which is always hard to defend against.

"But you can see from the errors that we did make why I have been brought here, and there's certainly a big job to do.

"But we will get on with it, and the players are determined to get it right.
"We are missing our three front-rowers, Chris Hill, Steve Nash and Ricky Bibey, and that doesn't help, but they could have done nothing with such a handling count."

Leigh will still be without those three key players for Sunday's clash, although Centurions are hoping that Mike Morrison, John Duffy and James Taylor will have benefitted from more game time as they get up to full match fitness.

Rovers arrive with a number of players with considerable Super League experience and the long-serving Stuart Dickens in the front row – a player who has proved Leigh's downfall on a number of occasions.

Former Saints full-back Ian Hardman, ex-Castleford man Tommy Saxton and former Harlequins forward Jonny Grayshon are other players who will have to be kept under a tight rein.