He's not doing a very good job then and should take his fair share of the blame.

To be honest, if Wilkin possessed the kind of leadership qualities we need right now he'd have exhibited at least some evidence of such throughout his playing career. Yes, he has assumed kicking responsibilities in the past. But mostly in isolated games. He has never shown sufficient consistency to warrant kicking duties over extended periods - as Paul Sculthorpe did on numerous occasions. He is a reliable third option who functions best working alongside better players.

I'm skeptical whether - at this stage of his career - he can change his game sufficiently to make a difference.

As for the wisdom of offering long-term contracts to player approaching the veteran stage of his career I'm similarly skeptical. That said, it's not like there's an endless conveyor belt of quality players to pick from.



I have some reservations about Royce's tactics. I do think we are standing far too flat. For Lomax - who I don't think is a natural scrum half - this seriously eats into his thinking time and the result is the kind of panic passes we saw on Friday night. We would be far better served standing just that little bit deeper thus giving Jonny more time to evaluate whether or not a pass is truly on.

I think that comment is a bit extreme. I think he starts to try too hard when he is not being given any options, That's the fault of the support runners and not his!!

Yes, once we're on the pitch, its the lads job to call the plays, but our problem isn't an innappropriate choice of play. We're not spreading the ball wide too early, nor is the problem that we're keeping it tight when it should go wide, we're not kicking short when we need to go long for territory. The problem is two fold - simple narrow moves close to the ruck are non existant whilst wide moves we call are slow and akward (not to mentioned having no space, thanks to the lack of narrow plays). I would suggest this is a training ground problem.

Wellens is the main issue in attack as we have to wait for him to catch up with play or attack with 12 men which makes it very easy to deal with.

The entire coaching set up appears to be inferior to other top teams. Conditioning and injuries have been horrid since Apollo left, and I don't really have much faith in KP either.

Just read that Lomax and LMS are out injured this week, with Flannery and Clough doutbful. Soliola is probably out, but that is with a knee injury, not any facial injuries sustained in the attack.

Could be worse, we could have Bradford's injury total, and on top of that they have lost Sammut to suspension also. Let's just hope we get the 2 points. COYS ♥

I don't think being forced to mix things up in the halves will do us too much harm at this stage. I'd like to see a Wheeler/Gaskell combination, as that would give us a much healthier range of options on the last tackle. We will miss Sia though, and with Clough also unavailable we're going to need telling contributions from Laffranchi and Perry.

DO you think one of the 3 young props will get a chance?

Possibly. I think most likely is that Magennis will get a call and do a short stint.

Thought he was injured.
I'm not his biggest fan, but he is a little different in his play, so he may mix things up a bit. I'd like to see Forster get a run out, though, and the bulls are missing a bit of weight through injury at the moment, so it may be a good time (assuming he's ok to play after his involvement in Sunday's tribulations).

A break wil do Lomax good, let him watch a couple of games and think about his own play. He'll hopefully comeback refreshed.

Flanagan returning will be a help in defence. At Huddersfield he was defending tight in to the ruck, and was hitting very hard indeed.

I'd agree with that. Put Lomax/Lance at full back.

As for the team's performances in general, I don't really see the point in saying anything yet. We've lost a couple of games we could have won on another day and more importantly we did the same thing last year before finishing up in a Grand Final that we should have won. Last year my concern was that the defence went backwards and nothing this year has convinced me that this has been addressed. Again, that was said last year and when it came to later in the season we were competitive on both sides of the ball albeit not that outstanding defensively (we did enough).

We've got some tough games coming up over the next six weeks or so and perhaps we'll have a better idea of where we're heading by then. It's all about confidence again. Had we taken the points against Catalans I'm sure the team would have felt strong enough to beat Huddersfield and Hull. We may miss Roby but we should have beaten Hull and could have been Huddersfield despite him going off. The season is a long way from being lost and as disappointing a start as it has been we've been here before with other sides and other coaches too so let's keep it rational and keep our heads.

Alas, we're not going to have that luxury, as Lomax is injured and Lance will be busy at hooker. For the time being we'll have to persist with Wellens.

But, if Wheels performs in the halves, it may force an issue when Lomax retuns to fitness?
It will be interesting to see if Gaskell stays at 2nd recevier or whether he'll move in to the ruck, or perhaps they'll play more left/right.