After the ups and downs of the Widnes , Sheffield and now Gateshead games I am beginning to have my doubts. We have seen what the team can do when they put their minds to it and some tremendous attacking displays and recoveries when they have been behind but somehow I think they lack the composure when it really matters.
I hope I am wrong but I sense we may end up very dissapointed by the end of the seaon. I cannot work out why, having been so cocky earlier on in the seson leaving the club, supporters and himself embarased(unless he is very thick skinned or just tactless) he has to make excuses about overseas players when his team were clearly not up for it and complacent (as against Sheffield and Gateshead not giving respect to the opposition)
Is this a man who perhaps would win friends for both the team and himself by holding his hand up and admitting his own shortcomings?

simply put "yes". We have a young up & coming coach who is backed by a vastly experienced football director.

Every coach/club will come across obstacles, Matt is aware of what happened in the off season was wrong & he nearly lost his job, but since then he's got on with his job & one of the major things I have noticed about our team is that they appear to want to play for each other, play for the club/the shirt. All too often in the recent past we have had players just turn up & you can see they havent been bothered. All this has changed & we are on our way up. No time for anyone to start having doubts, afteral, we are top of the league aren't we?

Top of the League
"Drew" against Castleford at The Jungle in the CC - normal time.

Is he up to it?

You bet.


Sack Faz

I think Fax as a team do seem to suffer when confidence is down and seem to struggle as you say with pressure. I'm sure this will improve with time and we will get stronger.

I do however feel that it's early days to jump on the coach or the teams back yet. If we were threatening relegation maybe but to criticise after a couple of bad games?

Matt may have said some "embarassing things," but I think it's all part of beefing up the game. I think he's a produced a damn good team who's enjoying a blooming good season. Lets get behind the boys and cheer them on and stop whinging and moaning like a geriatric pornstar's genitilia.

Positivity is the key, the players WANT to play for the club. That is a big plus and I feel the last thing we want to do, as fans, is to demoralise them and disengaging them from the team.

Yeah it will be a kick in the nads if we came away this season empty handed but sometimes thats just the way it is.

Believe and "our time will come".

This is a silly thread. How can you have doubt when we're sitting pretty at the top of the league for most of the year, unbeaten for a long stretch, almost beating a SL away and just plain unlucky not to be in the NRC final (but hammering everyone else in the run-up).

Totally Agree, MC is not upto it, Lets get rid and bring back Tony Anderson


Couple of Bad Results and people start looking for someone to Blame. We've had threads on here slating some players, and now questiong Matt Calland's ability. Despite having one of our best seasons (up to yet) in years.

Its times like these, with a bit of a dip in form we should be urging the team on to regain the previous form, not starting to nit pick about who's not good enough despite them having been ok for the first half of the season.

I completely agree. I am dumfounded by the thread.

Of course he is up to it, we have already had our best season, BY A COUNTRY MILE.

u got give the man a chance, he and MH have turned the club around on the field from mid-table to the league leaders. The current problems i believe are more mental than anything else. the fans and media now expect us to beat everyone and look good doing it, this a totally different pressure than early in the year when expectations were considerably lower.

we gotta trust that we have a good coach and good team and let them do the talking on the field and everything will sort itself out.

Definately up to it...he has built this team with MH and things take time. He`s only been a coach 2 minutes and he is learning all the time.

I wouldnt say it's all fans, Im certainly a realist, as im sure are a lot of fans who have followed us for many years.

All we've wanted over the last 10yrs is a team that will play with pride & show us what they can do. This team does that. Sure we will lose, but we'll win more games though.

Before MH & MC came aboard we didn't even make the playoffs in 2006.

Since then we've gone 56-1-23 (W-D-L) in competitive games.

Under MH we went 22-0-9, finished 3rd in league in 2007.
Under MC we're 34-1-14, 2008 - 18-1-10 3rd in league and so far 16-0-4 this year and currently top. Yes there is a way to go but MC is def up to the job.

Get behind the team and stop bloody moaning!!! !

Yep agent Calland doing Widnes proud, good on ya lad. Your home town colours always show.

Cant believe people are questioning if Matt is good enough when we are sitting clear at the top of the league with only 2 defeats so far. Have we beaten our closet rivals this year? Yes - if we hadnt then thats when we may have concern.

i Cant believe people are saying this rubbish, asking if he is up too it, having a dig at players on another thread, how can you have a go, top of the league, got to semi final of northern rail, nearly won at cas, if you have owt to say, leave it till end of season, and see what we have done, dont start getting on there back at this the most important time of the season,, still cant belive some people,, leave them alone