When we held onto the ball we competed. I thought we did ok working up the middle. The back row is a little light and although they are up for it and don't shirk the work they are stopped easily on a day when the step is nigh on impossible. We made no yardage away from the ruck.
I believe if we had held onto the ball better we would have won.
It isn't all doom and gloom.
We will need a couple of props for when we lose the Leeds boys and probably a back row to allow the coach to give Bentley and Wilkinson some time off maybe rotating them every week so they can recover and build some confidence.
Experience would be nice.
Overall it was disappointing to lose when we were in with a shout.

How many times did our players slip on the surface? Longer studs needed!

Scooting from dummy half also works best if you have a dummy runner at 1st receiver. Scooting when there is no runner at all is too obvious and a reason we got pushed back on occasion. All due to a lack of experience.

Same goes for the couple of occasions in the second half when Lilley got the ball on the last and got caught in two minds as to whether to kick. Both times we gifted possession over, once leading directly to a try.

The errors on the 1st tackle when we’d got field position in the second half killed us. We got no momentum up and spent most of it defending.

It was disappointing since we played very well in the first half.

This is becoming the theme though. It was certainly the case at Keighley and I believe was at KR last week (although I wasn't there for it). At Keighley it screamed of the young lads being fine when they're full of energy, but once they're tiring, they just can't handle the big b*ggers on the other team. It's totally understandable and isn't their fault at all, but this is where you really miss the size in your pack.

It's not coincidence we have a small pack and are losing it in the second half of games.

You say they can't handle them, and to an extent you're right - lord knows we are all banging on about getting some big props in from somewhere, anywhere - but if you look at the closeness of the final score and if you see the various things that went against us, and yet we were still in with a shout, we are actually far more competitive than I had dared hope we could be, certainly at this stage of th season. With a fair wind our young lightweights could easily have ended up winning yesterday, outmuscled as they were.

Makes it all the more frustrating eh?

The young lads won't be physically up to playing at this level consistently for much longer before an 80 point stuffing is given out.

I hope we have some reinforcements before that happens.

Yep, there will be some bruised and aching bones gingerly staggering about today, and they acn only (and should only be expected to) take so much.

Absolutely. And as Bullseye rightly says, that's what makes it even more frustrating.

On the plus side of it, does it give us a little hope that it may not need THAT much to set it right? A couple of good signings in the forwards and it may just make a big difference with how those scorelines end up.

I fear not. Bullseye made the very fair point that you can't keep playing all the youngsters for 80 mins week in week out as they won't be able to handle the physical aspects, early season is one thing, all fit and raring to go, 10 straight games in they'll not be able to walk.

True, but if you bring a couple of experienced and big forwards in now who can play most games, then the likes of Kirk, Bentley, Wilkinson etc. don't have to play every week. They can have a week off here, week off there. It's important though that we have those 2 experienced ones in first, supplemented with a few young loan lads to rotate with Bentley/Wilkinson/Kirk. I'd quite like to keep hold of Oledzki for that purpose, he's a big strong lad for his age and would go ok playing most but not all weeks.

Also if he gets knackered it becomes Leeds problem not ours



Ooops, did I just verbalise that?

Quote Bullseye="Bullseye"Makes it all the more frustrating eh? The young lads won't be physically up to playing at this level consistently for much longer before an 80 point stuffing is given out. =#FF0000I hope we have some reinforcements before that happens.'" How's about this fella. https://www.loverugbyleague.com/post/mo ... -bradford/

Quote Bullseye="Bullseye"Makes it all the more frustrating eh? The young lads won't be physically up to playing at this level consistently for much longer before an 80 point stuffing is given out. =#FF0000I hope we have some reinforcements before that happens.'" How's about this fella. https://www.loverugbyleague.com/post/mo ... -bradford/