Royston's move from full back to the back of the scrum proved the most inspired of a host of changes made by Calland in the wake of back to back losses to Celtic Crusaders.

Rovers held Fax to 8-8 at the break, but Royston's second score, less than a minute after the restart, fired the home side to an ultimately convincing victory.

"For his first game at loose forward, I thought Shad was magnificent," said Calland, who left out former Bradford and Harlequins wingman Andy Smith and was deprived of Lee Patterson, Mike Ratu and Danny Heaton through injury and Jon Goddard because of illness.

"He has been making some uncharacteristic errors at full back so I moved him and gave Miles Greenwood a chance there.

"I thought they both benefited, although the best is still to come from Miles.

"James Haley came in and had a really good game at right centre too - we cut them up every time we went to that side - and I was very pleased with him too.

"I always knew we would crack them eventually in the second, although perhaps not as soon as we did."

Predictably, after shipping almost 30 points a game over the last three weeks, Calland was more than happy with a defensive effort that saw Rovers score just once, when half back Paul Handforth sprinted clear from a loose Paul Southern offload.

"It's very pleasing, because we showed that we can defend," said Calland.

"We have been averaging something like 29 points over the last few weeks and yesterday we set them a goal of conceding 12 or fewer.

"The players worked hard, worked for each other and the things we did in training showed on the pitch."

Victory put Fax clear in second place, just a point behind unbeaten Salford but three clear of their nearest challengers.

"Are we?," said Calland.

"At this stage, we are not looking at the ladder."