SWINTON LIONS will be eager to bounce back from their New Year's Day mauling at Leigh when they take on Rochdale Hornets at Gigg Lane on Sunday (kick-off 3pm).

And while Lions chief executive Tony Barrow gave Leigh high praise, he reckons Sunday's match will be a real cracker.

"I think it will be a great game between two very evenly matched sides," said Barrow.

The Lions desperately need to erase the memory of that trip to Hilton Park and Barrow tipped Leigh to take the Northern Ford Premiership honours at the end of the season when he added: "Leigh have got everything -- speed, pace and power.

" We had a very bad opening 20 minutes or so and they just scored 30 points in no time at all. They looked good and we couldn't answer them. Leigh were just pipped in the Grand Final last year and I think they will be Grand Finalists again this year."

Swinton are hoping to have most of their injury worries out of the way by Sunday with Paul Loughlin, Phil Wareing, Kelvin Peet, Lee Hudson, Robert Russell and Tony Barrow all looking to shake off knocks.

Veteran Phil Veivers, who started the game against Leigh at loose forward, is likely to begin at stand off against Rochdale.

Veivers moved to that position at the start of the second half at Hilton Park and the Lions mananged to stem the tide after that, scoring a consolation try to boot through Phil Cushion.

Hornets, who have won just one of their opening four matches, will have former Swinton forward Wes Rogers in their ranks.

Rogers, who can play at prop or second row forward, has been signed from another neighbouring club, Oldham.

Dave Larder, son of another famous former Oldham stalwart, Phil, will be available again after work commitments kept him out of Rochdale's last match. He will slot into the second row if selected.

One man who won't be featuring is loose forward Danny Fearon. He has returned to Halifax Blue Sox after a loan spell with the Hornets.