It's spring, that time of year when there is a distinct aroma of bulli in the air. Bulls fans descending on The Shay from their homes all over...well Halifax. Boring us with tales of past greatness when the map of the world was pink and The British ruled India. Pretending they're still in SL and not in 'our' league. Let battle commence. Can Fax build on last week's cup win against London, or will the bullies still be on a high after their comeback against Fev? It's about time we got some consistency and fingers crossed, with home advantage I'll go with Fax by 14 points. Up The Fax!

Look on the positive side Pete.At least you will see a decent crowd,you will be outnumbered but the crowd will be good.
I’m forecasting a very close game Fax 18 v Bulls 24.And on Easter Monday Toulouse 34 v Fax 10, so a disappointing Easter for a Fax.

My tips for Leigh are Widnes 28 v Leigh 16 on Good Friday, and Leigh 30 v Dews 16 on Easter Monday so a bit better for us.However you know what my tipping is like.

Good news in the Cup though, I think you will beat Dews at Owl Lane, get maybe Saints at the Shay, for another good crowd.

Ian, 10 bullies dosen't 1 Fax fan make. Lol!

Thank you Charlie for tipping Bradford and Toulouse.
As always Charlie knows!
Gives Fax hope.

Its all very dependant on the team RM picks particulary against bfd all those fit from the london game deserve a chance on merit . Is chester butler any where near fit? Brandon moore fit? Those are the only additions that spring to mind . Mind you i thought the welsh lad did very well at hooker. Calcott has to be worth another punt . All good problems to have on selection form should dictate

It's hard to change a winning team but surely Sharpy must come back in.

Very critical of RM selections most of time but it looks like Sharp/Fairank/Moore back in for Davies/Cooper/Morris making us as strong as possible for Dulls with a free hit on Monday-think he's got that spot on.

I would say so. Up The Fax!

If results go as expected in our next 2 games it is going to be a struggle for us to make the top 5 which would be a disaster for the club. Its now time for the BOD to show some bottle and act otherwise our season could be over very quickly. We have gone backwards from last year, once again RM is let loose with the purse strings and fails to deliver. IMO it would be wise to use the prize money from the next round of the cup to pay RM off and give the new coach as long as possible to sort out which players need to go and use the rest of the season to try the younger lads to work out which may be up to it for next season.

Top 5, very difficult now.
On the one hand our slow start has cost us and we have dropped too many points in the opening games looking well off the pace of our rivals.

On the other hand there has been a marked improvement over the last couple of games and there’s definitely the potential for more to come with a few players still to come back into contention but as above likely too late.

Yesterday’s loss was down to one wrong flat pass and just not slowing the play and using our heads to close the game down.

We were the wrong side of a lot of decisions again rightly or wrongly and was the only way Bradford got down the field.

In open running play I don’t think they had one clean break all the game which again emphasises the need of controlled discipline.

Why ?

Lots of teams don't make the top five year after year but they're still here.

Try not to be such a drama queen.

Au contraire. Any of the top eight, plus Widnes, could make the top five.

The league is markedly stronger than previous years with both York and Bradford coming and Widnes coming down. I'm not quite sure anyone who wants to get rid of Marshall has a viable alternative and how things would actually change. Yesterday was disappointing but JWH & BW have a decent on field chemistry and could be something to build on.

Lots of teams dont make the top 4 and then spend the full budget on a large squad(its been said this is our biggest spend since we came in to this league) with a view to finishing in the top 5 again, added to that less money coming in to the club for various reasons and its not really rocket science is it? There will be a few people at the club sweating after these recent results.

Simon Grix has to be the one and only choice. Won't take any BS, has the respect of the players, will cost less money than Marshall, will actually speak to the players and man manage them. Its a pretty simple choice and in my opinion its not if, its when.

All that said and done I do get that the league is stronger this year but that would be ok if we think we have stood still but the reality is we finished joint 2nd last year and spent a lot of money bringing players to the club to improve the squad. The results on the field do not show this and performances compared to last season have been poor. I mean 4th worst best defence in the league, strangely a lot of people seem to be ok with it all. Maybe that is part of the problem.

I didn’t say we couldn’t do it simply that it would be difficult, which it is.

Why?

Because deservedly so we aren’t in the top 5 now and have some ground to make up on some decent sides.

Based on form so far Fax have had 2 half decent performances against the better sides, 1 in the cup that we won and 1 in the league yesterday that we lost, a 50% ration won’t cut it.

Fax will have to string an unbeaten run together with hardly any room left for slip ups.

To do it my hope is based on we are improving and have the players if we start to click.

Yeah, we spent a lot of money going full time in 2015. It didn't work out for us.

We still here. Winning games.

Every team makes recruitment errors from time to time.

You're two points behind fifth place with 17 games to go.

The reality is that you could be in the top five by Monday.

Indeed, but do so, would mean going to Toulouse on Monday and getting the result and after that keep on getting the results, not impossible but “difficult” which is all that I said.

I believe Fax will give it real dig on Monday and we have a chance, not impossible but DIFFICULT.

Well we had that game won with 30 minutes to go and should have put another 20 points on them but we just went total brain fart. Steady the game down, make them work for everything.
No idea why we didn’t take 2 points at 6-0, the final score just shows why you should take those easy points, 4 tries each but they took everything we H and a couple the ref) gave them. Not blaming the ref for the result, that was our fault.

Its obviously going to be really annoying for you to have lost yesterday and I'm not here to crow about it. I personally still wouldn't have a clue what the top 5 will look like.

We've got out of jail a few times already this season by blitzing in the last 20. That luck will inevitably run out. You have plenty of improvement to come surely. We aren't seeing remotely the best of fax yet. Then there's erratic Feath. Are they going to turn up and cut loose or just play bang average. Impossible to predict. And finally York. I've always thought people will eventually become wise to them and that their natural place is 6th to 8th. But fair play to them so far.

Point being it's still a cracker of a league and you're more than capable of clicking and getting 5th. A few of us are in the same boat .

We threw it away Literally

As others have stated, Fax failed to close out again,14 points up, going into final quarter, time for possession rugby, up the jumper style, complete your set,
Marshall said it is a team game, then lays blame at J W H, maybe it was his wrong option that started the collapse, but there should be enough experience on the field to have had the situation under control.
As Norman said simple game take the points, tick over the score board, get the ball back they can't score. Every one Likes to see attractive expansive rugby, but every one would prefer 2 points at full time. Come on Fax. still believe in the final countdown for top 5

At the moment ignoring the London game, the problem we are finding is that on their day most of the teams above us are capable of beating each other and its ended up with most performing above where they were expected to. Added to that we seem unable to join that group in been able to beat any of the top sides, infact been on the wrong side of some big scores and not even competing with teams who in reality we probably should be doing. We now have 2 very tough games with the inevitable drubbing in Toulouse followed by a tough game in Sheffield which on current form looks unwinable(who would have thought that at the start of the season) but we will mosey on by with people telling us we will come good.

They were carp on Friday.

Couldn't complete for toffee.