YORK City Knights Ladies head coach Daryl North has hailed his side’s good Women's Challenge Cup run as a big boost ahead of their semi-final at Castleford Tigers.

North also said the performance last week against the same opponents in the Women's Super League – which ended in 40-10 defeat – has given him confidence they can challenge at the Mend-A-Hose Jungle tomorrow (11am).

The Knights remain without a point at the foot of the league table, but in the cup have enjoyed big wins over Widnes Vikings and Barrow, which have proved they are too good for the Championship, regardless of their travails in the elite tier. Those games have also provided welcome relief, believes North.

“I’m quite excited about it," he said of the last-four tie. "Had it been a few weeks ago I would have been nervous playing a very good team, but with the performance last week I’m happy and know we can do better.

“We played Barrow the week before and I don’t think the performance was necessarily our best but we put points by them.

“Then at Cas last week, the effort was unreal. I’m certain the cup run helps because if you keep losing games heavily it gets demoralising."

North, however, is not so sure that York will get any major tactical advantage from playing the Tigresses so recently.

“I would like to think that's the case,” he said. “Stranger things happen. Players don’t perform to how they can, or they can surprise you.

“We know the key area to improve is scoring tries. We don’t need to change a lot defensively – they’re a good team and they are going to score tries, but attacking last time, we were held up four times and had another three good chances to score.

“Hopefully by working on those key areas we can run them a bit closer.

“We’ve been putting in good performances against good sides and it’s now just about doing it on the bigger stage.”

Alisha Clayton is injured and Chloe James has other commitments but the Knights welcome back Kayleigh Waller, Abbi Carter and Sam Boyes.