We won’t win a trophy until we cut down the unforced errors. Clearly it hasn’t hit home yet, obviously the Challenge Cup Final didn’t do the job. They’ve got a couple of weeks to sort it out if they fancy winning at Old Trafford.
We won’t win a trophy until we cut down the unforced errors. Clearly it hasn’t hit home yet, obviously the Challenge Cup Final didn’t do the job. They’ve got a couple of weeks to sort it out if they fancy winning at Old Trafford.
Steve Prescott MBE (1973-2013)
V
To be honest I thought we used tonight as an opposed training run. We tried different things in attack. some came off some didn't. We didn't really need to build any pressure with repeat sets, they put themselves under pressure by errors coming off their own line. I thought a few players were running good lines tonight and created plenty of gaps in their defensive line.. Quite e few of the errors came after the sudden downpour, from both sides. I was quite happy with the way things went. Hope we put a full team out again next week. No resting players unless they have a knock. Plenty of time to rest in the week off. i'm quietly confident at the moment.
Loyal and true, not a glory hunter.
Quite. I think this is a result of being so dominant throughout the year. When was the last time that we played a league game that really mattered? Lets be honest, we’ve had the LLS wrapped up since mid season. We just aren’t playing at an intensity that wins trophies. Nerves and desperation can bring the best out of a team. But we haven’t known that feeling for a long time through being so many points ahead in the table. The other teams in the top 5 have been scrapping for position over the last few months. To them, every game has mattered.
The play offs will bring a new level of intensity. I hope Holbrook has us ready for that.
screaming in the family corner, scaring the kiddies
Fage and Lomax, woeful. Don’t know what’s up with Lomax but he’s lost his spark at the moment. Absolutely flat performance other than a few breaks by Thompson, knowles, LMS. We seem utterly flat at the moment. Shame to be saying that after scoring 48 but Huddersfield were like an under 19’s team.
There’s a saying in sport.....
“YOU CAN ONLY BEAT WHAT’S PUT IN FRONT OF YOU”
We haven’t suddenly become a crap team. Warrington struggled against a •••••• poor Wakefield, Hull are so far off the boil it’s unbelievable.
Salford and Wigan are going well but we are far far better than both of them and if we take the chances in front of us we’ll be at the GF..
Can't stop the spirits when they need you.
This life is more than just a read through.
A lot of that is to do with our style of play our approach of fast passing and changing in direction at needs meets pretty good timing and thats what creating the unforced errors, I think week in week out our error count has been high over the last couple of months its got worse though and our completion rate is poor.
We just need to be a bit more conservative with composure ready for the play off football, I don't think our half backs are playing smart and thats mostly down to the absence of Coote for that long period. Our biggest errors at the moment is the ruck and PTB under interference which quite often the referees give too much tolerance to the defensive side.
Some harsh comments here imo. We weren’t perfect but we have had a sustained period of time with a chunk of players missing. It’s all about getting back to where we were or as close as possible. Thompson was excellent, Knowles was much better, so too Big Al and Roby. Coote will benefit from the game and will be better gain next week. That’s crucial for us. His goal kicking was outstanding and that may well be needed in the play offs. I thought we showed glimpses of our best again, scoring the kind of well-executed tries out wide that we’ve not scored for a few weeks. I actually thought Lomax and Fages were decent last night. Defence is a real plus, for me it’s just the short kicking and careless errors that need sorting. As above it’s often through trying to play the ball too fast, just a bit of composure needed
I agree.
Our defence is good but you can't invite pressure against good sides as they will wear you down and punish you.
Respect the ball, force pressure and kick well. That's the key to tight games which is what will happen in the Play Offs. The likes of Wigan and Warrington will try to slow our ruck speed down if we face them and the refs will allow it so we've got to nail it in the forwards and force pressure rather than relinquishing ball like we did at Wembley and tonight.
We scored some nice tries last night but Hudds were as bad as any team I've seen this season.
Originally Posted by Despondent Dave
Is it just me? Nobody's mentioned Peyroux (correct me if I'm wrong). He offered himself up a lot last night and really got stuck in. Not usually into stats etc but I think he would be up there. Mention to Kyle who's improving every game; passing, off loading in the tackle plus a try.
The conundrum here is that by focussing on these elements we would be moving away from the style that has resulted in us being runaway league leaders and adopting a Cunningham-esque style of boredom. Given the spate of injuries that we suffered over the past 6 weeks, allied with the rotation of players to provide rest, we have not had our top playmakers on the field together for a prolonged period. I believe it is this rustiness that has mainly contributed to our low completion rates and think that we should continue to try to play our natural game to reinforce our superiority.
Agreed.
We have a problem with overplaying at key times as well. Yesterday it was at 18-0 up when we knew one more score would kill the game. Hudds were rocking and putting a couple of straightforward sets together would have been enough to finish them off. Instead we just kept turning the ball over because we were trying to score on every play.
Obviously against that opposition it doesn’t matter, but like you I’m worried that this side is not addressing its biggest weaknesses.
There’s no doubt for me - if we overplay like that in the playoffs we’ll either lose at OT or we won’t get there.
There isn’t a rule that you have to play the same way for 80 minutes every single week. Obviously every team favours a certain way of playing and have things that work for them but the really good teams play what’s in front of them and can adapt their ‘style’ to what the game needs at that time. If you only play one way 24/7 and can’t change or adapt then you’re in trouble. It doesn’t have to be one of the other.
We seem to go from one extreme to the other. Sometimes I think we look very overcoached. Happens every week and again yesterday where we start a set near our own line, we make some good ground through the middle, play really fast, Huddersfield were going backwards. But then we go away from the middle, Roby spins the ball to Fages or Lomax who turns Peyroux/Taia back on the inside and all that happens is the defence resets. It’s a pre-planned set of six but if you’re a forward playing for Wigan or Warrington, you’d rather have Peyroux taking an inside ball on his own than Walmsley/Thompson/Knowles all flooding through the middle, Coote kicking the ball in the air and then having to run all the way back to carry off your own line.
Then we have other periods where we’ve got forwards stood still passing behind each other, or we’re flinging the ball from side aimlessly or we’re throwing daft passes.
Also think we’re setting Lomax up like we did Barba last year. He was given some shocking passes again last night.
Last edited by Tez the Saint; 7th September 2019 at 12:09.
Steve Prescott MBE (1973-2013)
V
Whilst you make a fair point, our tactics need to be adaptable and flexible and we need to be able to win in different ways.
We're not in the middle of June now where the weather is perfect and the tracks are dry. The pitches are slowing down and as a result points will be harder to come by in the bigger games.
Rustiness may be a factor in some of our errors and hopefully the next game will help eradicate those befor the Play Offs but in pretty much every semi final we've played since Holbrook has come in, we've self destructed when put under pressure. Hopefully we panic less and put the pressure on the opposition because they will crack if we do.
Originally Posted by Despondent Dave