Salford boss Shaun McRae expressed sympathy with the club’s fans as his side slumped to a fifth straight defeat.

Catalans Dragons ended their winless run in the Engage Super League this season by fighting back from a half-time deficit to post a 24-12 victory tonight.

The Dragons bounced back from a humiliating 58-0 hammering at Wigan last week with a vastly improved show thanks to tries from Chris Walker (two), Clint Greenshields, Setaimata Sa and Sebastien Raguin.

Defeat for Salford was their fifth of the campaign and sees them replace Dragons at the foot of the standings, but it could have been so much better after leading 12-8 at the break.

McRae said: “The fans are entitled to be frustrated and agitated, but we are the same. The players are all down in the dressing room.

“We tried hard and thought we could build on the last two weeks but we were never in it in the second half.

“I didn’t think we were playing particularly well even when we led 12-8 at half-time.

“We were off the pace and needed an intensity lift which we didn’t get. We came up with too many errors and all their tries came off our mistakes.

“We defended well in the first half and that took its toll but we did not put Catalans under enough pressure.

“They are a pretty complete unit even with a couple of key players missing.

Brighter

“Clearly we did not compete as well as in the last two weeks against Leeds and Bradford.

“I will certainly be considering changes for our next match at Harlequins next Sunday.”

Salford made the brighter start after Greenshields lost the ball from the kick-off.

But it took the Reds until the 19th minute to grab their first try in 100 minutes of rugby when Stefan Ratchford fed Willie Talau to power over.

Ratchford tagged on the conversion but Catalans hit back when Walker finished off a slick handling move to go over in the corner after 24 minutes.

And five minutes later Sa’s surging break allowed Dimitri Pelo to send Walker over for his second of the evening.

The Reds led at the break after Greenshields’ poor pass was snapped up by Mark Henry for Ashley Gibson to scoot over in the corner and Ratchford landed the touchline conversion.

The Reds were then lucky not to have Stuart Littler sin-binned for a blatant professional foul, before a poor Ratchford chip kick enabled the Dragons to race the full length of the field for Greenshields to cross in the corner, with Greg Mounis booting the conversion for 14-12.

That try was the first of three in 19 minutes as Catalans stretched their legs.

Sa forced his way over for try number four with Mounis again on target, and the result was put beyond any doubt when Sa created the final try of the evening for Raguin as Salford ran out of steam.

Meanwhile, in the Carnegie Challenge Cup, Swinton travelled to Warrington Wizards and triumphed 34-22 but Leigh MR went down at home 20-40 to Whitehaven.