Round-up: Marsh double gives Widnes reasons to be cheerful

Last season's bottom club, Widnes, got off to a more encouraging start to this season of Super League with a 28-14 win at the London Broncos. The Vikings were without their two big signings, Gareth Hock and Kevin Brown, with injuries, but Stefan Marsh stepped up to the plate with two tries.

Steve Menzies, who will be 40 in April, also scored two for the Catalan Dragons in their 32-24 win at Hull KR, which marked Laurent Frayssinous's debut as the French side's coach.

Jarrod Sammut was another two-try man, in Bradford's 40-6 thrashing of Wakefield. The result, achieved despite being denied their share of the Sky allocation for going into administration last season, made it a winning start for another new coach, Francis Cummins.

St Helens' partnership with Nathan Brown got off to a dismal start on Saturday when they were hammered by an astonishing 40-4 by his previous club Huddersfield. Leroy Cudjoe scored two of the Giants' tries in their first victory at Saints for 35 years.

Leeds began the defence of their title with a 36-6 thrashing of a Hull side expected to be among their challengers this season. Hull were not helped by the loss of their high- profile new signing and captain, Gareth Ellis, who injured his foot in the warm-up.

Sam Tomkins scored a hat-trick of tries in Wigan's 42-0 canter at Salford. The City Reds included three new signings after last week's life-saving takeover and coach Phil Veivers said they were three months behind the rest of Super League in preparation.