I'm sure you only come on here for the surreal TT

The entire spine of the team was playing out of position and we're massively light right across the board. Defence wins games and all that, and at times it was dire yesterday, but your attack is setting up the field position for the defence to do its job. We made just shy of 900 metres in the game. On average Saints have conceded 1300 metres per match this year. We made less than 3/4 of the typical dent in their defence. You can have all the defensive coaches in the world but if you're not getting the field position then you haven't got the buffer to keep them out.

The fourth try in the first half was the most disappointing to me and felt like the moment the floodgates were kicked open.

More of the same next week I'm afraid.

It's ok guys,I don't think we were targeting the Saints game.

Agree,Gale has class but its not top imo.I doubt his inclusion would have made a blind bit of difference yesterday as I have yet to see him be a match winner since he arrived.

I am serious though,I don't think we were targeting the Saints game.

No fire power/Pace/Defensive heart---simple as that imo.

Saints are by far the better team even if we had our first choice players on the park, so a win was always unlikely. It's the schoolboy errors which are hard to take though as irrespective of "class" you would think professional players should be able to pass and catch the ball and not put themselves under so much pressure. Hopefully we will have a few more players back from injury for next week in Manchester - fingers crossed.

You are Phil Clarke & I claim my 5 pies.

Now you're just splitting hilaires...

Be fair, he never mentioned Wiggin once.....

Don't think Hilaire is down as a specific 'defensive' coach, just as assistant coach. Obviously you'd expect he [and Francis] would coach defence, but to be fair, the lack of a specialist is just one of a myriad of reasons that we are where we are.

We weren't, but these blowout scorelines mean we basically are one further point behind.


Yep, time has so far proved both of these points. I was just watching the Warrington highlights again, and when we were under serious pressure and behind, he produced two pieces of class in particular, the first as the delayed short pass to Olbison coming back on the angle for his try; the second was the blinder setting up Kear's vital matchwinner. You can't produce those, especially under severe pressure, if you don't have some class, sadly he looks like he will never be the complete package as he doesn't do it anywhere near consistently. Frustrating, given that he clearly can


Warrington?

Anyway the only difference it might have made was to the size of the defeat, but that could be important. My point was, without him, we looked completely disorganised in contrast to the Wire game where he ran a lot of the show. (Though Danny Addy had a fine game against Wire too, and Gaskell was prominent; so we went from 3 on-form creative halfbacks to none.)

Starting Foster just for goalkicking is just stupid (and the fact he didnt even get chance to to that on sunday says it all) , George may as well not be here - may well of not been fully fit, but if he was he should of been on the wing,
For me foster should of been full back and Kear left were he plays best and George should of been on the other wing instead of Wood, yes he may ba just a kid and lacks experience but for me he just isnt good enough (like half the team on sunday to be fair),

For me when it was 0 - 0 and we made a break down the right and Henry kicked through for wood he should of been picking the ball up (as it was only the 4th tackle) not tyring to get his foot on it,
If we'd of gone on to score from that i reckon we'd of given them a game taking confidence from scoring first would of helped, albeit we probably still would of got beat just not as much as we did,

And i wouldnt normally say this either but i think we actually missed Luke Gale today, Addy did not have a clue with ball in hand, he is much more suited to where he played against Wire, and although he is an off the cuff type of player its clear to me letting Sammut go was a big mistake - he is what we could do with right now.

I think its a bit unfair to rag on George. FC says in the T&A that he wasn't fit but 'put his hand up to play' because - basically there was nobody else. The only other bench option was Conroy, which would have meant two hookers on the bench!

So, all kudos to George for doing a brief stint when he was carrying, by all reports, a rib injury that probably meant he was hurting every time he made any contact.

This is just stupid IMO though. This could be why we're picking up so many injuries. If he was carrying a knock, why not play a fresh Conroy? All we're doing is risking longer term injury to George. Why did he put him on when game was gone if he was carrying a knock. Same with Mellor. I asked why he played so little time and was told he was also carrying a knock. So why was he put back on with 3 mins left?

There would appear to be a problem in the conditioning/fitness management at the Bulls. They do seem to be picking up far more than their fair share of injuries.

Oh, we know. I mean, they should definitely have conditioned Kearney's thumb a lot more so that it wouldn't break, and that's just one. As for Luke George's ribs - well, they are definitely unfit.

OK - so nothing to do with having a pitifully small squad being stretched to the limit?

Other clubs have the comfort of being able to rest players carrying knocks - the Bulls don't have this luxury