PERRY WHITELEY is optimistic last week's Summer Bashing by Featherstone can "all be forgotten" - courtesy of victory away to once mighty Widnes.

Whiteley scored one of York City Knights' consolation tries against Rovers during the Betfred Championship's weekend away in Blackpool but their West Yorkshire rivals by then were on their way to a comprehensive 42-10 victory.

Next up this Sunday is another daunting task away at the former Super League Vikings, where James Ford's men, albeit a largely fringe team, succumbed 44-12 in the Challenge Cup fifth round in April.

However, spurred on by their 17-10 comeback victory over the Chemics in the league at Bootham Crescent on Easter Monday, Whiteley says the Knights - still sitting pretty in the top five - can regroup and go again.

"Knowing us we just need to regroup and have good preparation in training, fix up one or two things and go there and put in a good performance," said the 26-year-old winger.

"It's one of them. This league is tough but we know if we turn up and put in a performance we can compete with anyone.

"Against Featherstone we just weren't good enough and the scoreline showed that. We just need to fix things.

"We've got some hard games coming up but the frustrating thing (with the Summer Bash game against Featherstone) is we know we're more than capable of turning good teams over, like Widnes as we've shown.

"The good thing is we've got this week to rectify that (performance against Featherstone). We just need to regroup and have good preparation. Hopefully we can turn it all round and last week will all be forgotten. That's the beauty of it."

The Knights picked up six injuries on their cup trip to Halton Stadium, when Widnes ran in four tries in the final 14 minutes with York down to 12 then 11 men.

Whiteley played on the wing that day but sat out the return match in the league nine days later.

He reasoned: "We went to Widnes with quite a young team and with quite a few blokes missing.

"It was quite a convincing scoreline in the end for them but we ran them close for much of the game. We were down to 12 men for a while and down to 11 at the end - with no fit subs left after three or four injuries."

Last week's defeat to Featherstone, in the circumstances, was arguably more disappointing, although the Knights did battle on to the end to notch two scores.

Rovers had taken the lead slightly against the run of play with a Dane Chisholm interception try midway through the first half but then went clear with two tries immediately before the interval and five more in a 15-minute second-half blitz.

Said Whiteley: "It was an open game for the first 25 minutes. We got out of our own half well and we defended well, but the intercept changed the game and then maybe we made a few errors coming out with the ball and invited them on to our line.

"It got too fast at points and Fev are a decent team and there was a period where they obliterated us.

"It was down to us turning the ball over and silly penalties, and it got a bit too quick. There was a period, maybe 25 minutes, when they were just camped on our line. You can't give any team in this league that much possession in your own half, and they put the game to bed.

"We finished quite strongly but, as we've said, we can't give teams that much possession, especially a team like Fev. They're a top-five team.

"I just think (a lack of) game management and errors across the park cost us."

York had a period in the ascendancy without getting over the whitewash.

Whiteley said: "It's quite a narrow pitch and they looked to defend in the space, especially on my side. Their winger was always parked on the touchline so when we were trying to do our shifts, the free man was just jamming and it was just cutting off our plays all the time.

"They defended well and we maybe didn't play what was in front of us. We had a game plan of what we were going to do with the ball and maybe we needed to identify a few things and change it up.

"But credit to Featherstone. In the first half - or the majority of the game really - we didn't look like scoring which was quite disappointing. We need to fix that up."