So the coach only motivates the players? They don't need to motivate themselves? They are paid professional rugby players, they should be motivated every single week regardless of a coach being there or not. They should be committed also, it's their job.

Players shouldn't need to be motivated or asked to be committed as that should be a given. I can accept poor performance, lack of ability but I can't accept players not being committed as we the paying public pay their wages.

The days of Alex Murphy throwing cups of tea about and insulting players in order to fire them up are well gone.

Is it? We all go on about how Wane gets Wigan nashing at the teeth week in week out. No player plays to lose, and are motivated to win, but that's not enough. All players (even today) put their body on the line, and are committed to the cause, but that fire needs to come as a team.

What I find strange is how the likes of Wellens and Cunningham are involved in the coaching team yet either aren't allowed or failing to inspire the players around them

The players have to have self motivation. If they don't, they should retire now.

There's a difference between motivation and fire in the belly/ knashing the teeth/ whatever cliche you like.

If the players are going out with no motivation to win, I agree they should give up now. But that's not the issue - it's only after the game is gone that the apathy sets in...

Paid rugby players shouldn't need motivating. No player that has pride in his performance should lack commitment and motivation.

Like Brown said last week, if we don't back it up next week then it means nothing and as I thought, we didn't back it up.

Exactly, most of the blame has got to go onto the players, Brown challenged them to back up from last week and they have failed and surrendered similar to Catalans the week before.
We will beat Bradford next week, but I,m expecting that we might give London there first win of the season like we did last season or was the year before.
There is a lot of apathy in our games, playing out a penalty, forming a scrum, kicking out from the post is very slow and wasting time taking intensity out of a game is what annoys me the most.

No chance of losing to Laaaandon. They're so poor they'd struggle in the Championship. They'll run riot over Bradford too. If Super League was a goldfish, Bradford and London would be that long trail of dangly crap that sticks to it's ringpiece.

Browns post match comments

We've had exactly the same problems with motivation all year albeit on a larger and more damning scale, let's not forget you are heading the league to start with!!

I understand both MagicSuperBeetle's and St Pete's points regarding motivation from an external source (being the coach) and intrinsic (natural player motivation), it's quite simple but you have to have a good mix of both with the majority coming from the coach.

We've simply had a negative, passionless approach from Sandercock and to me his persona seems to match that of Brown, too careful, methodical but lacking real bite and a big contrast to that of Shaun Wane for example. It's all about player management too and obviously you're going to get the best results dealing with individuals needs as well as the team as a whole.

Going to say a real winning mentality stems from the coach, you've got extreme examples where a team (Leeds for example) have a set of players who have success ingrained in them but that's down to numerous coaches down the years drumming that into a close knit bunch.

In your example, Brown's always struck me as a guy who will only get you so far, that's not to say he won't be entirely successful to some, I would just predict you'll never win a major trophy with him in charge, he's still a better version of Craig Sandercock however.

Finally, the way Super League's set it's truly not right how teams almost go as far as 'choosing' to go through bad spells of form to provide a backs against the wall and the only way is up attitude for when it really matters i.e the end of season play-offs! It's not really fair on the fans who pay good money but that's the way the league is set up...a first past the post wins the league would change this mentality...

I'd really worry if you threw out a performance like this against Wigan or a Leeds or even a challenging for honours Hull KR side (wishful thinking but if anyone knows the history of RL they'd know we should be up there!!).

Good luck for the rest of the season.

I'm in utter shock we are top of the league. It shows that the standard is pretty poor these days.

Can't disagree with that, it's a point everyone agrees on, compare the quality to even 10 years ago and it's changed. Lightyears doesn't go far enough from the distance that we're away from the NRL.

I was listening on the radio today and was in shock as it was happening...However, on reflection it shouldn't be that shocking. How many times have we done this so far this season? It's becoming painful to watch us succumb to another team that we should be beating and beaten by such a margin. I've been embarrassed of this team far too often this season.

It's tiresome and if the players can't be d to put a shift in every week, then why should I be d?

What on earth is everyone else doing? How can we be top of the league. I can't get my head around that at all.

Wish I could disagree. I look at our present team and wonder how many would have been good enough to get into the Saints team of 99/2000/2002 & 2006...

None

a comment made on the radio was that the reason the results this year have been less predictable is not that the mid placed teams are getting better, but that the top teams are getting worse. and its very true.

Saints of 96 and 2005-7 would walk this league
Bradford of 2000 ish would walk this league
Wigan of 94-5 would walk this league.

in 2005 we could sign Jamie Lyon and had Darren Albert, 2 years later we signed Matt Gidley.
a year or so later Wigan had trent barratt and Leeds signed buderus
quality, world class signings.

9 years later or less NRL averagely good Luke Walsh is described as a superstar (Longy at 28 was far better)
Wigan's amazing signing was a player who retired before signing for them. Leeds' best player is 36 and they're second best 34