VIKINGS look set to welcome the cavalry in time for Sunday’s home clash with Castleford Tigers as they seek to arrest a run of three losses, writes Mike Parsons.

Head coach Denis Betts named skipper Kevin Brown, forward Hep Cahill, hooker Lloyd White and centre Chris Bridge as all being in the mix, only ruling out centre Charly Runciman.

Vikings, who were also without Stefan Marsh, Alex Gerrard and Setaimata Sa for their trip to Catalans Dragons on the back of a gruelling Easter, remain in Super League’s top three and have rewarded over the past week the early season form of Joe Mellor, Eamon O’Carroll and Chris Dean with contract extensions.

“We’ve lost three games on the bounce but everyone’s still pretty much buoyant, we’re in a strong position in the league and mentally,” he said.

“Physically, we’re hopefully going to get some bodies back and get ourselves strong again on the field.”

Vikings fell to Warrington, St Helens and Catalans Dragons over nine days.

Betts said: “The biggest problem is that everything came that quick on the back of some injuries. Changes to personnel in key positions has taken a little bit of potency out of our attack.

“We weren't able to train for the past three games. We had to change our team really late leading into Warrington, and from that point on we had two sessions and they were 20 minutes long.

“We did stuff off the field but it’s hard to do anything on the field when you’re dealing with a small group of players and they’re being asked to play games in quick succession.

“That attacking potency has dropped off for us. It’s not excuses but reasons why we haven’t been as fluid. We’ve still had opportunities but we just haven’t made the right decisions on the back of it.”