I've not heard anyone be to harsh lomax tbh but I place most of the blame on Holbrook.

Yes barba is the is top quality and has that x factor we've lacked for many years but the guy hasn't played rugby league in nearly a year and looked rusty and obviously not match fit. He shouldn't just walk into the 13 for last 4 games of the year.

The biggest problem for me tho was he unsettled the team. Barba doesn't know how anyone plays only from training. Lomax and Smith is brand new partnership in the halves and need time to gel and the business end if the season isn't the time to be looking at new combos. That gets done in pre season practice games and early season games.

Most teams with new spine at the start of the season need pre season friendlies and month of the season to gel and learn how each other play and coaches regularly comment on needing new combos to gel.

To Me , it's just utter madness to try totally new spine in must win game and the business end if the year.

Holbrook probably thinks your best chance of success this year is to get Barba to match fitness as quickly as possible. That means playing him the full 80 minutes while his match fitness is clearly lacking. If you manage to sneak 4th place it could turn out to be a good move.

He may be of the viewpoint that Saints are not in the position this year to win it.
He is therefore using this season as a developmental season to see what works and what doesnt.
He has seen how Fage and Richardson work together so now he is testing how Lomax and Smith work.
Based on that he will probably formulate the optimum solution for next season.

In the off season we will see lots of work done to change the players physiques to suit the playstyle Holbrook wants. The current players are all built for bash and barge rugby as per Cunninghams desire. I also anticipate lots of work will need to be done on learning the basics of how to pass. The players have been woefully deskilled in this area, and while they have made significant improvements under Holbrook there is still a lot of improvement that can be gained.

Not a chance he doesn't think we can win it this year. If we get 4th we need to win two in row and we are champions. We've beat cas, Wigan, Leeds this year so no reason why we can't get there or win it if we make the 4.

That's what makes it even more crazy to change the spine now

I'd hope he isn't of this viewpoint seeing as we're so close to the top 4. If we were in the position Huddersfield are in i'd be all for him trying out different combinations.

100% agree

I,m sure he is aware that Saints have not missed a play-off in Superleague, so I still think he wants top 4, but the problem is he still doesn't know his best team to start a game. Our final executions are killing us though especially when this season we have very little rub of the green, for me Holbrook as yet has not implemented any smart set plays and looks as though he is match coaching off the seat of his pants.

Spot on mate, a stupid thing to do in the knock outs, plus Barba looked like he needed a mobility Scooter after 20 mins, should have started on the bench to come on not play full game with two woeful haves. Bet Fage was kicking his Skull cap around langtree watching that, arguably our player of season and gets dropped! and for what?

Is it possible that playing Barba was at least partly a commercial decision? Bums on seats?

You could say something similar for the reason to play Lomax at 6 to make room for Barba, isn't a portion of Lomaxs wages paid for by the RFL?

It was a bad call from Holbrook, however, I am more concerned with the poor start to the game, we need 100% completion rate for the first 15 minutes in future as seem to play better as the game goes on we just went so far behind due to not focussing on the basics in the early passages that we couldn't catch up.

He's swapping the combos about again this week he's said. Why experiment this time of the year? Utter madness

We werent that far off in the two previous games points wise even though we arent playing great attacking rugby, for me against Wigan I would have gone with

1 Lomax
6 Fages (along with Tommy and Roby in our top 3 this season by a country mile)
7 Smith
sub Barba

Keep the continuity, players used to each other in a big game, keep it tight early on, settle into the game and not panic trying to throw the ball about, get Barba on when the fatigue starts to set in and we hopefully would look a bit better in attack.

Instead as others have mentioned we disrupted a large chunk of the spine plus Lomax was poor away at Cas when we got beat at their place playing at 6 after not playing their in a long time. We just repeated the same with Lomax in a big game after him not playing at stand off in a while again and effectively said to him theirs the stand off position, go and perform! Not fair on the lad.

For me it was a bad call by Holbrook/coaching team to disrupt the team so much and leave Fages out in this big game but I think we had to include Barba in the 17. I am sure Holbrook will learn from this and I would like to see Richards back in now starting in the halves. My choices for the Wakefield game would now be

1 Lomax
6 Fages
7 Richardson
sub Barba

Nothing much wrong with that 1, 6 and 7 last time we played Wakefield and won. Barba again coming off the bench to use his attacking ability from fullback and getting used to the players plus match fitter, Lomax then available to cover in the halves, hooker etc if someone not on their game on the day.

I think Richardson should be given his place now until the end of the season and tell him to go out and play and play at pace, with Smith missing out unless injuries or loss of form......just IMO

COYSaints

He s on about changing the halves again and I feel Smith will make way this week. He was impressed with lomax and barba so I'd imagine Richardson will come in at 7 and fages will go on bench as Amor been axed.

It's the right thing to do this week but all this chopping and changes at crucial part of the season has cost us 4th spot..ws just got to hope we win and hull beat Wigan

I bet lomax is wondering how this guy has come and took his fullback spot without earning it.

Said it all along that barba should have been on bench and had to earn his spot