this.
J-Lo needs to prove he is our long term option at FB which might be difficult if McD keeps up these performances

Lomax has always struggled with positional awareness in defence where Mr "Radar" Wellens was the best around. McDonnell is currently doing a lot of good things especially in support play but has not really been tested properly in defence. Lomax was good 2 seasons ago but injuries are slowing him down and he now needs to prove himself on the durability front.
If Lomax became available for selection today I think McDonnell would still keep the full back shirt.

Fully fit lomax is better than McDonnell every day of the week without shadow of a doubt.

I think you've firgotten just how good he was. If he gets to that standerd again we will have to wait and see but Lomax is 1000000% better

I think the question is will we see a fully fit Lomax again I hope so, we need to be cruel here we don,t want to see a player who only lasts 3 games. Mc Donnell has been offered a contract longer than expected, maybe the club are not sure if we are going to see the real Johnny Lomax, hopefully he can get the injury curse of his back.

We offered McDonnell a deal to the end of the season which he turned down. He wanted more money and next season if he was to up sticks again. Saints refused and left it at that. When more injuries cropped up to the likes of Dawson, wello and percy, we was thin on the ground and gave Shannon what he wanted when lance retired.

So it's got nothing to do with us not thinking lomax won't be back, it's about us having to many injuries in the fullback spot.

Also, I don't think lomax will be fit for the start of next season either.


Nothing agsinst Shannon tho, he's looking pretty decent. His support play is very good.

He's in good form and we probably did underestimate him when he came. Last time he didn't really get much of a shot because of his injury.

It's worth remembering that McDonnell was once Hull's marquee signing. They were paying him a fair wedge, IIRC. Just bad luck he picked up an injury.

If you look online there's a decent highlights reel of his from a couple of years ago. His footwork and pace were always very good - even if he did have a tendency to occasionally try to sidestep an opponent four times at once.

Actually, I think it says more about your inability to stop him.

McDonnell has never let us down, he runs great support lines and will score plenty of tries. He's absolutely worth his place in the squad, but obviously I'd love to see wee Jonny back and fully fit

Lomax is better than McDonnell in all aspects IMO. McDonnell is a bit ropey defensively from what I've seen so far and whilst Lomax's positioning isn't as good as Wellens's was in his pomp (and who really expects it to be at this stage?) it's on par with McDonnell's and his one on one tackling is better than McDonnell's.

In an attacking sense Lomax is better with ball in hand and has a more evasive running style. As long as he gets fit again he'll be number 1.

Having said that, McDonnell has done a bloody good job coming in and his playing style is what we needed after Lomax's injury.

Lomax is a better player but McDonnell is an excellent back up player and will put Lomax under pressure next season when he eventually returns from injury.

McDonnell has fitted in exceptionally well to our style of play. He reads the game well, his support play is very good (probably his biggest strength) and the timing of his passing and knowing when to run is decent too. He's weak in defence but positionally he's fairly good and I've not seen many kicks get the better of him yet. I'm glad we've got him until the end of next season as it give us that insurance in the position and allows us to time assess Lomax & our options next season.

Lomax wont get back in at number 1. Even when fully fit hes no where near as good as Saints fans say he is.

Im more than happy with McDonnell as our full back

Regards

King James

Shamefully i agree Lomax came back the shadow of the player he was and this latest set back maybe a injury to far?

I'm hoping i'm wrong but it will be very hard to get back that blistering pace he once had.

Its a bit of a worry for Johnny because his strength of change in pace and direction might be diminished. Wellens was a defensive full back with good positioning to chomp into the line on second face attacks, Johnny is an attacking full back with a weakness of reading plays in defence. So if his attacking prowness suffers then we could possibly looking at average performances, we really need him to fully recover to provide that X factor performance we know he was once capable of.