Says it all really. Don't care what people say about the number of close games lost, we rea just not at the races defencively The coach must bear some responsibility for this - it has been a failing during all his seasons with us but something that Noble has always done well

In the future we will have the best defence in the league.

It's been a problem since day one. Especially the right side which seems to be especially vulnerable. Players seem unaware of which way to move and are caught out by dummy runners. It's either down to poor decision making and technique or the players simply don't know what they're doing.

I never realised Sykes was so weak in defence until this year. When he connects he hits hard but he misses so many.

rl3 a game. Keef just the one.rl

Indeed. And having just had a quick look I can't find a centre with a worse defensive record this season.

Oh and Keef has made seventy more tackles as well... Sykes is missing one in four...

On a more positive note, nice to see BJ still in second place for try assists. Not bad for a guy playing out of position

But I can find two other players in our team, who worryingly (and perhaps predictably) play down the same defensive side. If we go on missed tackles as a percentage of tackles made, then Sykes is at a 20% miss ratio (223 tackles, 46 missed.) We also have Paul Deacon missing 20% (50 missed from 245 made) and Sherriffe missing 35% (24 missed from 72 made). Jeffries also misses around 20% of tackles.

When you consider that the top of the missed takle count stat wise for the league is Scott Murrell on 76 missed tackles which looks bad, but we need to consider that this is from 689 made, meaning he only misses 11%. By the same measure Senior only misses 5% two of our top performers are Lynch who only misses 6% and Nero only misses 9%.

Having that much liablity down one flank is not sustainable, no wonder teams always seem to stroll in down that side. It needs addressing....but I'm not holding my breath.

Although they may be getting used to their partnerships, maybe it would be good to try Nero + Sheriffe and Sykes + Tadulala. This way both sides have at least one good tackler.

This is exactly what I would try.

Well the current combo is not working on defence thats for sure. Menzies and Nero into the , Sykes and Jeffries into 6 and 7? Maybe try Rinaldi at 7 when hes back too, I struggle to see the benefit of keeping Deacs in the side at the moment.

You've just saved me a post! Having just trawled through the stats its obvious why we've shipped so many points with the right side of Sykes and Sheriffe. Add in Jeffries and Deacon and that's just too many turnstile defenders on the fringes.

If I had the time I'd be interested to see who has the highest percentage of missed tackles in SL. By the looks of it we're right up there with these three.

Looking at Sykes's stats for missed tackles over the past years they look like this:

Sykes:

2008 - 13% missed
2007 - 14% missed
2006 - 19% missed
2005 - 19% missed

Now he's up to a 20% miss rate. Defending has never been his strong point has it?

It's time for Macca to prove he has the balls to drop the underfperformers. If Rinaldi is fit, this would be my team.


Halley
Sheriffe
Menzies
Nero
Tadulala
Jeffries
Rinaldi
Lynch
Newton
Scruton
Langley
Worrincy
Burgess

Kopzcak
Godwin
Donaldson
Crossley

I do think we need another prop on the bench tbf instead of shifting Sam about, although he did have a good game against Cas imo. Also, if Sheriffe continues to under-perform I would consider putting Halley there and giving Platt another shot at FB. I know he is condemned by many, but he had a cracker in the reserve grade.

Given this line up - who kicks goals...