I'll second that

The enormous performance boost from Bradford to Leeds was 95% down to the players pulling their fingers out for the first time this season - fact. No coach who has ever lived could pull around that kind of transformation that quickly purely off his own bat. Royce is now revealed as clearly not the man to take Saints forward and should probably never have had the job in the first place, noone is arguing that, but the players we had out against Bradford and Hull should have won both games with whatever tactics they were employing, and would have done so easily had they put in even remotely the same kind of stint they did against Leeds. The players must shoulder more of the blame than Simmons, an honest guy doing his best who was just a little out of his depth and unable to cope with Player Power at the end of the day.

Some slightly less than gifted people always resort to childish insults at these times I find. Very silly.


Well, you will never know will you. We certainly played that well at times last season, with just not quite as many offloads. We need to be careful with that as Warrington will be far more savvy than Leeds were.


Except me of course. I stand by my position because I still believe it was the wrong thing to do. It is a pity that there was not another way to kick the backsides of our senior players and it's a shame players can have unprofessional attitudes and get away with it completely scot-free. That doesn't happen in any other field of employment.

I find the players simpering support for Simmons to be a little sickening. It was their performances that lost him his job, and to dedicate last night's perfomrace to him is really just a kick in the slats. Having said that, I am absolutely delighted that we have at last turned in a top performance, and if Simmons was sacrificed to that end, then so be it.

We could make an educated guess, though.
Except for you....
Of course.

Guilt and shame can do that to people.


I thought he was an incompetent coach? Not that I don't agree with your statement; I definitely do. But you don't seem to, judging by your other posts.

They aren't going to come out and call him a clueless idiot though are they?

I don't understand? I have always been completely behind Royce. Check my posts.

I agree with all that but I fear for what state we'll be left in in a couple of months' time if KC and Rush are eventually revealed to not be up to the job and the players all start to pull their bottom lips over their heads and take their balls home with them again. Royce was clearly no genius (the unused back on the bench and utter inability of any of our halves to ever pass to their right maddened the hell out of me every single game), but he was good enough to get basically the same set of players as we currently have to both a Wembley final and a Grand Final win last season (in [iincredibly[/i difficult circumstances let's not forget), a couple of unluckily timed injuries excepted. He would have been good enough to give us a decent chance of the same again this year if the players had done the jobs they were paid to do. Now instead we're in limbo for the rest of the year and our season could go either way. I know which situation would make me happier right now.

I agree that player power has to be stomped out, and for that reason the next coach has to have an authoritarian streak backed up 100% by the board. We cannot afford to end up in a Chelsea situation where the players decide they no longer care for the manager and have him removed.

Sorry. My bad. I'm used to the abuse and so I just reacted as I would to more abuse!

I agree with the authoritarian streak thing. My only concern about Royce was that he was just too nice and sympathetic. Some characters will just walk all over that. Also, I think there were a few bruised egos as a result of his rotation policy.

I think it's interesting, for example, that Meli played on the wing again having been shifted to centre actually during Potter's time. I wonder whether that was Meli saying he wanted to play on the wing and getting his way? My guess is probably it is. He managed to let Leeds cross on his side again I notice. Fortunately luck was with us this time though and the try was ruled out for a knock on. It wasn't a Grand Final either!

Meli asked to play wing and got his way

What a silly post!

Interesting. I don't know what position Brad Dwyer plays in but according to League Weekly, he sat on the bench for the full 80 minutes for Warrington on Friday night. I guess Tony Smith is no genius either?

Nor is Phil Veivers. He used only 16 players when Salford played us at Langtree Park. The back stayed on the bench, as did ours.