We will see.

That's Catalan and now Warrington in last few weeks.

Catalan aren't pants now though even taking into consideration their shakey away performances.

I'm concerned that our performance against London was not good enough to give us momentum going into a game against a potentially resurgent Bradford, especially bearing in mind that Magic Weekend follows that and Warrington are bound to up their game against us even if they are a little lacking in the halfback department this season. For my own personal peace of mind, we needed to have performed as we did in the first 20 minutes against London for at least 60 minutes in order for me to feel like we will turn Bradford over. As it is, Walsh's returning form aside, I don't feel any more comfortable with Saints this week as I did last week.

I reckon Bradford will get a try or two. But I think the scoreline against Wire shows there weakness is defensively.

At the moment I imagine they are quite entertaining to watch, I'd hope we are doing training drills on defense this week, as if we need to keep improving this through the season. If we are to be contenders, I would expect our point against average to start dropping.

I haven't checked this but apparently us and Wire are equal 5th on defence.

Let's not get carried away with the 48 we scored against London. Our attack is nothing special in recent weeks, we are struggling to get any go forward and often stuck in our own half.

To sum up our recent form, we are woeful in defence and very average in attack which doesn't bode well going to a team that just beat Warrington and Catalan.

Don't get me wrong, the wolves and cats ain't the greatest so far this year but we are currently in shocking form.

If we play how we can, we will win and pretty easy but on current form, I think the bulls will win. That defeat at the DW was a wake up call and they have reacted how a team who's been bagged off should react, unlike the mighty allstars at saints.

It's not the 48 points against London, it's the 18 points we put in against Leeds that makes me think we have the attacking qualities.

I really do see the Easter period as a falling off the horse.

We should have been better than that, not saying enough to win, but enough to do better.

How tough was our Easter in reality ?

Not very really in terms of being tired. We rested nearly the whole team for Widnes and went to Leeds fresh. We might have scored 18 points but let's be honest we was awful with the ball.

It was tougher than Wigan's and Leeds if you look at the lead up.

We should have been better no doubt, but I'm not going to dismiss all other games and just look at Easter and say we are hopeless.

We are in the fight more this year than last year and the year before. We have better quality across most if not all positions.

I still reckon top 2 is the aim

Yes but Bradford have shipped in double what Saints and Wire have. Hence my point about Bradford having a leaky defense.

We'll do ok.

I agree it was tougher in the build up and post Easter but the players had a rest at Widnes and went into the Leeds game fresh and some might say battle hardned.

Lomax, swift, Turner, Percy, Walsh, Amor, Roby, walmsley etc off the top of my head was rested at Widnes so they had 7 days off to rest and prepare which is more than enough.

Swift had 3 weeks rest, turner played 1 game in 3 weeks, Percy month off, Walsh had 3 weeks off this year, Amor had 3/4 weeks off this year, Wilkin had 3 game ban, Lms 2 game ban so it's not like we have been flogged, in fact most the team should be fresh.

Add that to some close intense games, we actually could say we had a very good prep for the Leeds game. It's not great going into a big game without being in deep water, it's not the best going into the Leeds game smashing Eveyone and it's not great going in tired which we couldn't have been.

We are making excuses up and the isn't any. It's simple, if the other team puts 100% effort in and we put 70% effort in and with Wigan and Leeds ability they will win.


So basically -


Was we too tired ? No!

Was we battle hardened for the game ? Yes!


Did we play to our ability ? No!

Was we committed ? No!

Like I say we should have been better no doubt, but these 3 games don't have to pan out to be a reader for the rest of the season.

I'm a glass half full kinda guy.

We are nearly half the way through the season and league wise regards to wins and losses there is one point between us and Leeds and we where the ones to take those 2 points off them.

Aye, if have took two games lost at the half way point and one game we fielded at weakened team (still good enough to win that day). I think if we went to Widnes with full team we'd prob win.

Can't knock the position in the table. Second is very good but it's the performances we've been putting in which is the worry. I know you'll say it's about peaking in September and not May and I agree but the way Leeds and Wigan beat us has left me worried. I don't think we can win then type of ganes, if you can't win them games, you can't win the grand final.

We won't finish in the top 2 and I highly doubt a old Trafford appearance .

If we lose to Wigan in the same manner come the return leg, I may start to worry.

But I still remember the season at Widnes were we lost against all the big guns in every game that year.

We drew Wigan twice in the playoffs and we beat them twice.

I'd be happy if our defense tightens up as that is what will win a final. But it only needs to improve slowly. We won't fix it all by Millenium weekend.

Our league position is very strong at his stage. Leeds are the stand out team so far this season so to be in their sights is a good place to be. If we can finish top 2 (and that should be our aim) then we should all be very happy.

The worry for me is our recent performances especially defensively. Compare our points against to Leeds and it is miles apart. Our points for is slightly behind them so I'm not too concerned about that but we're shipping in far too many points and this has to be the focus or the rest of the season. Come the play offs,you simpl cannot afford to be shipping in so many points, the defence has to be at it's best.

I agree I remember them too but invariably we would raise our game on the big occasion , I'm not sure we have the people to do that these days.