‘No excuses’ for Halifax Panthers in fresh start after ‘turbulent’ year

Halifax Panthers’ will not have any “excuses” in 2027 as the club looks to put a “turbulent” year behind them.

That is the view of Curtis Davies who has recently signed a new deal to keep him at The Shay next season.

Curtis Davies in action for Halifax Panthers against his former club Dewsbury Rams earlier this season. He says there will be "no excuses" for Fax in 2027 after a "turbulent" 2026. Photo by John Clifton.

placeholder image — Curtis Davies in action for Halifax Panthers against his former club Dewsbury Rams earlier this season. He says there will be "no excuses" for Fax in 2027 after a "turbulent" 2026. Photo by John Clifton.

Davies re-signed for Fax in March after the club was reborn following its compulsory liquidation in February.

He went onto win the club’s Top Tackler award at the end of season’s awards earlier this month, having been on the Halifax books for four seasons from 2018.

Curtis Davies has signed a new deal with Halifax Panthers having re-joined in March 2026. He previously played for the club between 2018 and 2021 - here is in action against Batley Bulldogs in a Challenge Cup tie in 2021. Picture by Ed Sykes/SWpix.com

“It was a bit of a turbulent year last year,” the hooker told the Courier. “But towards the end of the year you could see it all coming together. We probably didn’t get the results we deserved but we were a bit behind with us being so thin on the ground, so it will be nice to look forward to having no excuses next year.

“Last year there was always that lingering and having the excuse of we’ve got such and such circumstances holding us back. It will be nice going to next year having no excuse and seeing where we can get to.

“There were some good lessons for us in what was a tough year and it will serve us well going forward.”

Asked what it was like on a week-to-week basis in 2026, Davies said: “We all still had a job to do. It didn’t change anything. It was difficult for a few reasons but we still had a job to do and we tried to do the best job possible.

“When everything is so uncertain the only thing you can do is focus on yourself, and that is a good lesson you can take from it. That was the mindset around that period and then just to let everything else unfold as it did.”

Despite the uncertainty and challenging circumstance, one thing was a constant, positive presence at The Shay; head coach Kyle Eastmond.

“For me and my position he has been class,” Davies revealed. “The best thing about Kyle is the standards he holds everybody to. Even through the tough periods where there might have been excuses, he didn’t search for any. That’s what I like and that is definitely one of the reasons I stayed around personally.”

See next week’s Courier for the second part of our interview with Curtis Davies