Yet you appear to be calling for one to take Senior's place in 1st grade?

You're happy with Senior are you ?

I'm happier with Senior than I am with the alternative if it's as you described on this thread.

in a game like rugby league, there is a tendency for people to get a bit carried away. In both good times and bad.

We have some problems, right now we dont seem to be hitting form, bar the first half against Wigan we havent been great. But thats not to say the team isnt full of class and that A) it will only take some minor surgery for us to improve a great deal and B) there isnt some improvement in this squad of players anyway.

Right now we have some struggles upfront and in our direction. We have two massive improvements sat in the physios room in Peacock and Mcguire, we will improve drastically when they return.

Also something we need to keep in mind is that whilst we are struggling we will notice the negatives and ignore the positives, its one posters raison d'etre to highlight these negatives and ignore these positives but hopefully those in charge will be able to see the bigger picture.

Players like Lauitiiti, Pitts, and Burgess will improve when they have better ball and better set plays and better support for offloading, Hauraki, Burrow and Ablett will look better when they are being put through gaps against a tired defence warn out by better forward play. Senior, Hall, Watkins will look better when they are doing more attacking and less defending, Brent Webb will look better when he is chiming into the line not acting as our 2nd pivot.

There is more right than wrong with this squad, and it wont take a lot for us to turn that corner.

That's a very insightful post TA and when you think about it fairly accurate. Still think we have issues that won't simply dissapear when we get bodies back but nice positive post. Your certainly half full sort.

dont get me wrong, I think we have some obvious problems. But I also dont think other teams are full of supermen.

Take Wigan for example, Their strength as a whole squad last season somehow culminated in a fairly superfluous player like Richards becoming MoS. If im preparing a side to face Wigan, im not doing anything to prepare for Pat Richards. Its their structures that made him look like a world beater. I wouldnt take any of their back line over ours (bar maybe Tomkins over Webb) but theirs looked better last year because of their dominance up front and the work they made teams defensively left more space out wide.

Thats where we are falling down, Senior is probably a little past it, but he is still better than either of Wigans centres, he embarrassed Shenton last year, and im not scared of Chris Bridge. But Senior is struggling because the work he is doing is against fresh defences with little space and generally in his own half. You give him the space and work that Shenton or Carmont has been doing and he will look a lot better.

Some very good points Smokey but i dissagree re-Senior he's off form far more than on it these past 2 seasons and performances like Wire away or the CC semi last year are too few and far between whilst getting outplayed so many times against kids and players he should be destroying and tbh i hope he'll get the Legends send off he deserves at the end of this season.

Indeed. Some people appear to want him dropped for the sake of dropping him. At a time when BJB, Smith and Delaney are injured they'll happily throw anyone in with scant disregard for whether this warm body will actually be any better than Senior, regardless of how badly Senior is playing.

I'm just thankful these geniuses don't actually have any input into coaching our team. These same geniuses would take a week or two to be calling for the head of any young kid thrown in, in place of Senior as soon as that kid didn't measure up, like they were doing with Watkins just a few weeks back.

Not everyone was calling for Watkins to be dropped AND Delaney is back this week and from my own pov he should dropped for poor form ,nothing sinister or even just benched.
You yourself have called for players out of form to be dropped in the past have you not?

Are you trying to tell me that playing a mobile second rower with decent hands (such as a Delaney or Ablett) in the left centre wouldn't represent a better option than Senior on current form?

Or shifting Watkins in one (defensive issues and all) and putting a youngster on the wing?

At the moment, Senior is offering nothing in either attack or defence other than occupying space. A warm body would be a positive improvement over a stone-handed statue.

At the moment Delaney isn't available. Smith, BJB and Hardaker have all been unavailable so bringing Watkins off the wing might not be an option. Besides, Watkins has looked much more comfortable there than he did at centre when many fans on here were calling for his head.

With Hauraki now joining Ali on the injured list moving a second rower might not be an option.

All I am saying is that there may not be a better option available at this moment in time. If there isn't, there is little point dropping a player to "punish" him for a poor run of form. Especially a player who, when on form, can still be one of the best in the competition. If options become available and his form doesn't improve then by all means make the move. Now doesn't appear to be that time.

And the message to the players becomes "play as badly as you like lads, you're not going to lose your place because I haven't gone anyone else"?