Not a single Leeds forward ran 100M with the ball. Our 4 props on the day took 41 drives between them for a total of 270M an average gain of 6M. This is why we lost, they don't work anything like hard enough with the ball. Everything else comes from the platform your front row sets (or doesn't). 3 of the Wakey starting pack ran more than 100M or more.

Fix this and we will be OK, don't and it will be a long old season. Again.

Looking at the stats on the super league page, Wakefields props made 210 metres, so 60 metres less than ours, and that's with Mik going down with HIA

The Wakey Pack made more metres than the Leeds pack, Wakey starting pack 432M, Leeds starting pack 341M. Almost 100M more.

Yes, but you said that our props were the reason we lost, when they actually outgained the Wakefield props.

As I stated it was our backrowers that were ineffective not the props.

Quote christopher="christopher"Full stats here, not sure how it shows how weak our pack was? https://www.superleague.co.uk/match-centre/report/43416 We had 27 play the balls in the opposition half versus 19 (a rarity last year) Made 38 tackle busts compared to 13 for Wakefield Wakefield had 38 missed tackles compared to our 13. If were going of selected stats that would show our issue was a total lack of attacking threat not being dominated in the pack.'" It showed not a single forward in a Leeds shirt made 100m and Wakefield’s did. Their pack out gunned us. Weak.

Quote christopher="christopher"Full stats here, not sure how it shows how weak our pack was? https://www.superleague.co.uk/match-centre/report/43416 We had 27 play the balls in the opposition half versus 19 (a rarity last year) Made 38 tackle busts compared to 13 for Wakefield Wakefield had 38 missed tackles compared to our 13. If were going of selected stats that would show our issue was a total lack of attacking threat not being dominated in the pack.'" It showed not a single forward in a Leeds shirt made 100m and Wakefield’s did. Their pack out gunned us. Weak.

Sitting behind the sticks, it was clear to see that our three outside defensive players intentionally ran diagonally inwards when attempting to press the Wakey attack. This was why we were nearly always leaving overlaps on either wing.

It looked as if this was an instruction rather than individual decisions.

If we can address this issue then we would reduce the attack of the opposition considerably.

Their pack did but it wasn’t because of our props

Our second rows were shocking. As was our edge defence, the gap to let Truman through was amateurish.

They did actually address this in the second half, what they didn’t address was the terrible attacking shape and structure.

After 20 minutes it felt like a pin being stuck into a balloon of optimism.

To me, we are best the "off the field" club in Super League, as the attendance proves, but "on the field" we are 8th or 9th.

How we can build up to a crescendo in pre-season and produce that is beyond disappointing.

BA is saying all the right things, but Black and White it made not a jot of difference to the performance.

Early days indeed, but our coach did not get a tune out of his players on Saturday. Let's hope the players start to translate the message against Salford and I mean the real Salford not the reserves!!

Even if our forwards get on top , which will not happen very often , our backs are not very good anyway . A full back who has a mistake in him any moment , a scrum half who is garbage , one of the best wingers in Super League pretending he is a centre , the most over rated centre in Super League who rarely has a good game , a thirty seven year old playing on the wrong wing.

I've taken a couple of days before posting anything mainly because I was so totally dejected by our performance. We all have our personal scapegoats (Ackers and the two first choice second rows lead the pack for me) but the truth is that collectively we were very poor. All the usual failings were on show from the first set of the game, and the atmosphere in the ground reflected that as the minutes dragged by. First game of the season, I know, but felt like every game of the last years. We cannot afford lose to Salford.