Quins blown away at the KC

Hull FC made light of Sean Long's absence, running in five tries during a 28-4 demolition of Harlequins at a freezing, rainswept KC Stadium.

After impressive successes in their first two fixtures, Hull's bubble was burst last weekend when, without injured playmaker Long, they were surprisingly beaten 18-16 by the Crusaders.

That posed questions about how capable they were of performing without their skipper but, despite Long's absence and the omission of understudy Jordan Tansey for disciplinary reasons, Richard Agar's men provided the right answers.

The performance of debutant Jordan Turner, who played out of position in the halves, will have particularly pleased Agar, but there was little for opposite number Brian McDermott to smile about as his men slumped to a third defeat.

Breathless

Close-season recruit Craig Fitzgibbon opened the scoring for Hull after a breathless opening nine minutes with his first try in Super League.

Willie Manu gave the Australian a simple run in under the posts after Richard Whiting's delayed pass sprung Manu through a huge gap in the midfield defence.

And the hosts were almost in again three minutes later but Danny Tickle's final pass to Craig Hall was forward.

Hull were totally dominating the battle for field position and further reward duly came in the 20th minute when Kirk Yeaman crashed over from short range on Shaun Berrigan's pass direct from dummy half.

Tickle's second successful conversion opened a 12-0 lead.

The visitors' reply should have been instant but Luke Williamson dropped David Howell's offload a metre from the line.

The video referee was required to spare Quins in the 27th minute by ruling Hall had failed to ground Mark Calderwood's deflected grubber - although Hull did at least earn a penalty for Williamson's tackle earlier in the move.

Curving run

Quins defended stoutly to keep their deficit to 12 points at the break but Hull added a third try shortly after the resumption, Hall going over on a curving run from just inside his own half.

Tickle added the Black-and-Whites' fourth in the 68th minute, encountering little trouble in darting over from the play-of-the-ball.

Tony Clubb did get the London side on the scoreboard with 15 minutes left, although video replays suggested Whiting had beaten him to the grounding.

Richard Horne dummied his way over from 10 metres out to get Hull moving again and they could have added a further score before the finish if Tickle had collected Horne's kick correctly.