Woods coached the development side at Australian side Penrith for two years

New coach Dave Woods believes winning promotion with York City Knights would be 'easy' compared to the work he put in to take his old club Gateshead up.

"Gateshead is not a rugby league town," Woods told BBC Radio York. "There's no juniors, no reserve grade, no supporter base, no fans.

"It's completely different in York. It's in a much healthier state."

Aussie Woods has twice won promotion, at Castleford, as well as Gateshead, but he knows the other side of it.

He was sacked by Cas, despite leading them back to Super League in 2005.

Then he was also sacked by Gateshead after winning promotion to Championship in 2008.

And he sympathised with James Ratcliffe's sacking by York on Monday, admitting: "I know what it's like because it's happened to me.

"It's a motto I live by. When the team's playing well it's because the players are good, and when the team's not playing well it's the coach's fault."

The players are now playing for contracts for next year Dave Woods

Woods, who first arrived at York in April as the club's new director of rugby, has inherited a side who are probably underachieving, fifth in Championship One.

But he also inherits an injury list, the most worrying name on which is loose forward Richard Blakeway.

"He may miss the rest of the year," said Woods. "He'll see a knee specialist on Thursday."

Brett Waller, Steve Lewis and Paul Stamp will also be out for at least two weeks with various knocks.

"The players that are coming back are coming back at a good time," added Woods.

"The players are now playing for contracts for next year, so they know what's at stake. Hopefully they'll put in the hard work.

"There are a lot of good players here, a lot of good young kids coming through, local ones as well.

"I'm looking forward to getting hands-on with them. These are exciting times, really."

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