YORK City Knights RL Club are likely to be handed arguably the toughest pool in the group stages of the Buddies National League Cup.

The season gets underway with the Buddies Cup, which will see the 20 National League teams split into four regional groups of five. Clubs will play each team in their group home and away and twice face cross-pool opposition.

The ten matches, along with the early rounds of the Challenge Cup, will take place before the league kicks off on Good Friday, April 18, with the knockout stages being interspersed with league fixtures.

Although the Rugby Football League have not confirmed the groups, it is expected that the new York club will be in the East Group with Featherstone, Hull KR, Doncaster and Sheffield Eagles.

The first three are division one clubs while Sheffield will be among the favourites for promotion from division two. Furthermore, the cross-pool group matches are expected to pit teams from division two, like York, against sides from division one.

Knights' Chief Executive Ferres said: "It's the toughest of the groups but you get what you're given. It will be a good test of where we're going and what we need to do to achieve that standard."

Likely Groups: North: Barrow, Chorley, Whitehaven, Workington and Gateshead. Central: Batley, Dewsbury, Hunslet, Keighley, and London Skolars. East: Doncaster, Featherstone, Hull K.R., Sheffield and York. West: Salford, Leigh, Swinton, Oldham and Rochdale.

Former Featherstone flier Chris Spurr has spurned the Knights' advances and has joined Batley Bulldogs instead.

Team-mate Gavin Swinson - who it has emerged was another Knights target - has also decided to join the National League division one side rather than step into division two with York.

Spurr, a 23-year-old centre, who can also play at loose-forward, had looked likely to sign for the Knights after being released by Fev, but Batley swooped with a bigger pay deal.

Ferres was disappointed the two had gone to Mount Pleasant but said there were other irons in the fire.

"They rang me up to thank me for our interest but said they've agreed to join Batley," he explained. "At the end of the day we offered them a deal which we thought was appropriate but Batley came along and upped the ante. We've set our benchmark with those two players and we will be straining to replace those with players of equal or better ability."

The Knights have only Mark Cain and Darren Callaghan officially signed up along with player-coach Paul Broadbent ahead of the season start on January 19. But the fact Spurr and Swinson were wanted by division one clubs shows the Knights are looking to put together a strong squad for their division two campaign.

"They're the sort of players I'm looking for. That's the standard we're looking at," said Ferres.

"I'm concerned at the way things are going but I do believe we will gradually put it together. I always said it won't be easy to get players but the lads we've already got on board believe in what we're doing and others will come through. We've got other irons in the fire but we're being pretty selective. We're trying to achieve a standard that will make us competitive."

Updated: 12:06 Tuesday, November 05, 2002