I'm struggling to see where this idea of a great pack for Saints is coming from. I was watching Hull's forwards closely last night and I don't know of any Saints forwards - bar perhaps Laffranchi and of course Robes - who drives forward like theirs did. Their pack was immense. So was Wigan's against us. Both would flatten ours. We go to ground very quickly and don't appear to have the strength or drive or aggression or whatever is needed to push the opposition back. I'm not counting the last few games here because our opposition has been flimsy. I'm thinking of the games where we have played opposition who we expect to challenge us.

Personally I don't think we will get very far this season although hopefully I'm wrong. We have pretty much everyone fit with probably only Wilkin who we are really missing (TP tends to be hit and miss in terms of value to our forward pack). Having Meli on the wing, for instance, gives me recurring nightmares the minute the opposition drifts in his direction and with all our young players last season came a level of enthusiasm I have yet to see in our team this year, bar perhaps against Leeds (although whether that was enthusiasm or shock I don't know!).

I think we are still missing Jammer's fire and leadership on the pitch. We are prone to losing focus, playing to one side, playing one up and switching off in defence. Without his presence to reinforce our direction and kick the team in the collective pants, I just don't think we have it.

Unless the coaching staff manage to turn things around significantly in training this week, our performance against Wakefield looks ominously like a defeat on Saturday. I'm still going to the match, mind. But nothing that I saw on Friday night reassured me that we are a team chomping at the bit to bash Wigan into next week or indeed one that has the necessary ability to be in a position to do so.

I totally agree with your comments on our pack, it's ok but not great. I don't think we have big enough forwards and lack aggression. Sia, roby and Laffranchi have all played well but the rest have been average.

If the Wigan pack comes out and is fired up then we will struggle with them. We are just to soft.

Meli has been doing ok on the wing, he's working hard when running the ball out of our 20 but showed Friday night he's still capable of giving tries away.

Oops. I forgot about Sia. But would include him in our good forwards. The rest really don't impress me.


I agree.


Meli is crap and wouldn't even get the tries he has been getting if our playmakers actually bothered to pass to the right.

So glad Meli won't be with us next season.

I think LMS has improved a hell of a lot over the last two month, he's showing he's a better player off the bench.

Sia has been awesome for us this year but just check his stats against willie Manu.

As for the season: I can't see us finishing top 4. We will be slogging it out for 5th alongside Leeds and Hull FC.

With the start that we had I'd say that a 5th finish would be a good achievement, but for a Saints team that should be competing it is a true reflection on how badly we have played this season.

For me the Challenge Cup is our only realistic chance of winning something this season, and if we don't beat Wigan next week then I can't see us making a final.

If you were to rank our season on a grade system so far you'd have to see we're at a C or a D. We were very poor to start with, our worst performances for years and some horror results putting us down the bottom of the league. The victories against Leeds and Warrington have pushed up our grade and to be fair to Rush and KC, one defeat in their tenure so far is a good return.

I think we play the ruck well and when Roby is there, it makes a huge difference. He is a freak of a player who has pretty much everything. Everything comes through him and if the speed at the ruck isn't there we seem to suffer quite badly, which is a massive concern. It makes us a bit predictable. This for me is where the halves have to step up and create more on the edges. Compare the Warrington and Leeds games to recent displays and the organisation of our dummy runners and structured plays were far better in those 2 games than recently. I think we need to replicate our offensive displays from the Leeds / Wire games on a more regular basis and the forwards need to offload the ball and be less conservative sometimes. On the plus side, I feel alot more comfortable in our defence under Rush / KC than I did under Royce. The players seem comfortable in this current structure and barring the Widnes cup game (where Rush slammed the players), we've defended pretty well. Sure we conceded points against Wigan, but Wigan scored alot of good tries that day and they are capable of racking up 40 / 50pts easily against teams.

Going forward, I think we should put all our eggs into next weeks basket and go for the cup. It is our biggest game of the season by far. If we win next week there is no reason why we can't win the cup. Wigan look the strongest team right now, so to knock them out would be a huge result and would give us a strong chance. I personally think we'll finish 4th or 5th in the league. I don't think Catalans and Hull will maintain full consistency and Huddersfield always seem to have a sticky spell at some stage. We just need to hang on the coat tails of these teams along with Leeds and stay around there. Wigan should finish top and Warrington will be top 3 also. Whilst we are capable of making the Grand Final, it'll be difficult from lower down the league.

Psychologically, next weeks game is massive, and extends beyond the cup. If we win I reckon it will set us up nicely for tge rest of the season with the confidence that we can beat anyone in tge big games, no matter where we finish in the top eight. Lose, and we might as well hold the end of season party, because confidence will be shot, and I could see us taking a pasting in the next few difficult games, possibly even slipping back out of the top eight.

That's what I think as well.

I would also add I'm not as confident as Blobby in our defence. I don't think we look any different to how we looked under Simmons defensively and KC/Rush insist on letting Meli remain on the wing which, as we found out on Friday night, is an accident waiting to happen.

I am also still of the view that we are limited not by the coach but by the playing staff we have and that is why we are no more capable now of playing creatively when Robes is either absent or rendered ineffective than we were at the outset of the season. Our losses prior to Leeds were without Robes and we would go the same way again if he was out injured again.

We have missed Wilkin as an attacking threat and hopefully he will be back in the team on Saturday. He at least sometimes remembers that we have a right edge and chooses to use it. Robes/our halves seem incapable of passing anywhere other than to the left which is a great shame, especially while we have Makinson on the wing as he is pacey and a great finisher.

I'm going to stick with a top 4 finish and a win in the CC for the season.

I just think that whilst we maybe under performing we look at other teams and overate their capabilities. Leeds hammered Catalan a few weeks back and then got turned over by Hull. We got beaten by Hull then hammered Leeds. In the top 7 or 8 teams are more capable of overturning each other than they where previously.

I don't think we will lose as many games in the 2nd half of the year as we did at in the first half. We do look comfortable in defence, I think on Friday we looked a little uninterested at times. There was not the intensity I expected and maybe the draw with Wigan has wrongly distracted the players, when we are not focused, then our weak spots like Meli seam to go to sleep. He should have easly caught that kick and Wakey should have been niled. But then look at the Wigan game, they went a million miles an hour then lost their focus and let Hull KR come back at them, but never into a dangerous position.

We took Sia off and if he was not injured seriously that was the coach looking to next week with the game won.

Wigan are the club to beat, but I'd rather meet them now than at the back end of the year in a final.

It's a very even competition this year and although we've underperformed there isn't that much between being top of the tree and eighth in terms of ability. Consistency is an issue for many but I wonder if that's as much down to the cap continuing to bite than it is a reflection on teams' ability to back up.

The one thing that is a concern is something that others have often compared about but I get the feeling that it's just me having a moan this year and that's quick PTBs and the ruck area. I know Rogues, AP and a few others have often gone on about this being the basis of the British game but this year it's been non-stop. Every team does it now. When Wigoon beat us recently it was like watching Saints play against an Ian Millward team. If that's the way the competition is going to play out this year with little attention to the rucks then we're in with a very good shout because we have the best in the world at exploiting those spaces.

Hooray!!! Meli made a single error in a game which allows us members of the clueless, knee-jerk, one-eyed, braindead numpty brigade to reinforce our bizarrelly formed world view and have some kind of limited justification for blaming everything bad that's happened over the season so far on our designated scapegoat!!! Meanwhile we can continue to laud the mostly ineffective Makinson with similar lack of justification or reason. Let us rejoice brothers!!!

I think our pack, in terms of players, can handle the opposition packs.
For an example - even when we were playing badly, i thought we were out mucsling the Hull pack and it was only a couple of individual flashes that broke the game intheir favour.
The only problem with the pack is our forwards are a little one dimensionsal in terms of them ebing unspectacular toilers. Given how much we thrive on a quick PTB, I think even poor teams boss us around to much on the floor.

I'm not sure about Magennis. He looks like a tank, but sees to be dominated too easily. I wonder if Forster will be better long term. I'd get him (Magennis) out on loan and see what impact he can make on another squad.

We're also looking like we've got a pretty short play book. I complained loudly about us playing one up rugby under Royce, and when we got back those extra runners around the ruch I was delighted. Whilst its still working to a degree (Clough's inside ball to Wello for Friday's opening try), it seems like that's all we're running with, with Lomax not really seeming like he's got much up his sleeve.

Wigan are a hungry beast at the moment. They dominate us mainly by being up quick in defence. The effectiveness seemed to [iwane[/i as the season went on, perhaps as they became fatigued through their gruelling playing fashion,but at the moment they're still in full flight. If we are to beat them, we first of all need to match their commitment in defence and attack. They're also very slick out wide, so if we don't knock them down in the forwards they'll punish us.

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