Originally Posted by
Tez the Saint
They're trying to win rugby matches mate, they're not trying to be some circus act. He started Lee because he knew that if we stayed in the match, Walmsley and Roby would take the game up a notch and it would be up to Leeds to try and stay with us. In my mind that's a good decision, not too many had Lee in their starting 13 and it made a difference to the game. Why's that "safe" or "dull", it was effective and gave us the upper hand. It was a decision that helped us win the match. Richardson played his first game, he's not ready to be commanding and taking on the lead at this stage of his career, it's not how half back play works. Wilkin called the plays and by taking first receiver, he allowed Fages and Richardson to play out the back but with the lisence to call for the ball when they wanted it which is what happened. We didn't put too much pressure on Richardson, we let him find his own way in the game which was the right thing to do IMO. He made some mistakes yesterday but he'd have made a hell of a lot more had Wilkin not been there, as it was he did a sound job in his first game and he'll be more confident for the next one. He have them a role that suited their abilities and strengths.
That's just not true at all though. You can tell from watching Fages and Richardson that they aren't scrum halves at Super League level, they're stand-offs. You need someone in there who'll be in the game constantly, will bring others into the game constantly, will get the team into the right areas of the field. We played off Wilkin because we wanted to shift the ball to the third and fourth defender so we could move an aging pack around the field. We didn't need Richardson to be Luke Walsh last night because he's not in the same universe yet, he's a young lad playing in a big game and needed to find his feet. If you play Richardson as a genuine 7, you don't win the game. I'm not really sure what you mean by creative but Fages scored a try, made a couple of half breaks, kicked the ball really well, he did everything you want from a half back. He didn't do anything out of this world because he's not a player who is out of the world, I'm not really sure what you're expecting. You leave out the fact that twice in the first half Fages had a four on three down the left edge and got Percival smashed twice, that's because he's not a consistent decision maker and sort of contradicts your hypothesis IMO.
We completed dreadfully in the first half because we tried to force offloads and they didn't stick. In the second-had we completed far better, kicked the ball really well and turned Leeds around. The pitch was soft and we needed to complete better so we did that, it's what the game was called for. We lost Lomax, had Morgan on the wing, Peyroux in the centre, we had another player injured as well (and remember who because I've not watched it back) it just wasn't the night or the game for that. He made a few decisions that helped win us the game, you just saying they're 'basic' or 'simple' or anything else is just irrelevant because there's nothing to back that up.
We got the most out of what we had last night and got a win. I didn't think we'd win last night heading into the game. I know you'll reply with a massive post, I'll stand my ground and we won't change each other's opinions because we want and look for difffent things out of the game. I look at it from a playing and winning perspective, you from a supporter and viewing perspective. We attacked poorly because it was a new structure on a cold night with the pressure on. We tried to play more expansively in the first half but it wasn't working and we were beating ourselves so he changed it and let's face it, had we continued to play as we did in the first half we'd have lost the game because the first 40 mins was as poor a half as you'll see really with the ball.