{"id":500198,"date":"2026-03-28T14:22:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T14:22:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/500198\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T14:22:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T14:22:12","slug":"castleford-tigers-boss-explains-mikaele-ravalawa-decision-as-latest-signing-hailed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/500198\/","title":{"rendered":"Castleford Tigers boss explains Mikaele Ravalawa decision as latest signing hailed"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Castleford Tigers head coach Ryan Carr has explained his decision to drop winger Mikaele Ravalawa for Thursday\u2019s 40-28 win over Bradford Bulls<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ravalawa was a notable omission from the squad on Thursday night with the ex-NRL winger the main casualty from the side that lost 72-6 to Warrington Wolves in round five.<\/p>\n

Instead, Semi Valemei moved to the wing with centre Krystian Mapapalangi returning, helping set up winger Jason Qareqare for a hat-trick with that left edge pair coming in for huge praise from Carr when he spoke post-match.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a real talent is Maps. I\u2019m happy to see him playing some good rugby,\u201d the Tigers\u2019 head coach said in a video shared on the Castleford YouTube <\/a>channel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe missed him last week a bit there and Gary (Jason Qareqare) is backing himself, which pleases me. He always held back a bit but now he\u2019s backing himself, his speed and his ability and that sort of goes for all of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just want them to back themselves and be confident because they\u2019re all good players, I just want to make sure they understand that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Castleford Tigers boss reveals Ravalawa injury<\/p>\n

That duo\u2019s success further highlighted the decision to leave out Ravalawa, however, Carr explained that it was not solely down to performance as he revealed the ex-NRL man has been struggling with a leg injury.<\/p>\n

Asked about his omission, Carr said:\u00a0\u201cCouple of reasons, he\u2019s carrying a leg complaint that we need to get to the bottom of and figure it out so we\u2019re doing a bit of an investigation around that, which you would have seen in his running pattern at the end of games.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe starts off alright but then it wears down on him and also we were disappointed and he was disappointed with the performance last week, so we just felt like that was the best combination.\u201d<\/p>\n

Carr did conclude with support for the winger, stating:\u00a0\u201cI\u2019ve still got full confidence in him to do a job but we\u2019ve just got to make sure that we get him fit and healthy and at his flying best, which he can be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Having praised Wigan Warriors\u2019 loanee Tom Forber<\/a> when speaking to Sky Sports, Carr was asked again about the youngster and if there would be a prospect of a longer deal than the initial month.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019ve used five hookers now in six rounds,\u201d he said, before hailing the Wigan man.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love having him. He\u2019s fit in really well with the boys over the last 48 hours and I just want what is best for him. If he gives us that attitude and that level of effort then that\u2019s all we can ask for and whatever happens, happens after that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luke Robinson sacked, Hull KR struggling and why it could actually be Warrington Wolves\u2019 year? \u2013\u00a0click here to watch the latest episode of the Serious About Rugby League Show<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Castleford Tigers head coach Ryan Carr has explained his decision to drop winger Mikaele Ravalawa for Thursday\u2019s 40-28…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":500199,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-500198","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-rugby","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=500198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500198\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/500199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}