Smith's a permanent signing and should put pressure on Mendeika and Oakes. Having now watched Sunday's game I'd say Mendeika's side is the one that needs a bit of attention defensively. Oakes and Ryan played well.

Oh it sure is. I do think we will survive but it will be a long tough slog to get there. Rightly so that the odds are still us going down. But as I say these next 6 games will give us an indication as to where we are as a team and the league. First 3-4 weeks of a season are always up and down as you can't really gain much from it results wise. We can assume that Toulouse will be terrible away but we won't know for sure until they have played a couple of games away. And we can assume that Dewsbury will be awful but we won't really know until after 5-6 games.

Aye we need some permanent signings. Larroyer is supposed to be here for a year but that recall option after a month will always be a factor. Hopefully we are signing two more forwards who will be permanent, added to that the Smith and Phoenix signing in the backs then we are looking alright. A lot will depend on the outcome of Moore's trial? on the 10th March. He could well be a permanent addition too.

According to the report I read, Cas have only signed Larroyer for a year so [if true] I can't imagine him being here for long.

In the final analysis, all games are winnable, particularly when you look at all the games we, 'should never have lost', but did, over the last two seasons. It's easier when you have a settled squad though. It's OK bringing loanees in, but it's much better when you don't have to - it's easier to engender team spirit, to have understanding between the players, not just of the plays but of the players themselves, so they all know what each other is capable of, how they like to receive the ball, who is likely to pop one 'out of the back', etc.

You would have to think that as the season goes on we will get a bit more conditioning (although we can't make up for the lost pre-season). This lot will definitely respond better to being full time than the crew we have had the last two years. Those young legs should be chasing everybody around the park come mid point of the season. The backs look devastating going forward and we have beefed up the pack. The two main things to improve are: cutting out silly penalties and stopping the opposition making easy yards when we defend. And third of the two is completion rate, stop dropping the ball especially early in the tackle count.

Yeah they signed him for a season, then loaned him to us for a season. After a month they have a 24 hour recall option.

Pretty much agree with your points there. Especially the ones regarding games we 'should never have lost' but have we continued that trend by losing to Rochdale? I mean all things considered I marked it down as a loss pre-game but we were in a position to win.

Oh, we definitely were in a position to win but lost out for many of the reasons I highlighted. We have some excellent young prospects and a few good solid pros in our side but they need to gel and move from being individuals to becoming a team. That takes time though, and particularly with our interrupted pre-season, in order to achieve that we need to keep the nucleus of the side together as long as we can, imo. Sadly, it is largely out of our hands though.

Yeah, it all depends if we stay up or not. For arguments sake we do stay up. We can keep the nucleolus of the side. For any team the 1, 6, 7 and 9 are key positions. Everyone else can pretty much chop and change. I think our left edge of Bentley, Oakes and Ryan are important to keep a hold of.

So for 2017 you have Thomas, Pryce, Keyes and Lumb/Moore. Pryce retires at years end. So potential for Pheonix to be the 6 (looks like a poor mans Benji Marshall on the videos). So the nucleus would be Thomas?, Pheonix, Keyes and Lumb. All very young players. Build around these guys and the left edge and we are looking very good

I would urge you not to get ahead of yourself esp with regard to Phoenix who hasn't even put a boot on yet.

Ah I never get a head of myself! Just enjoy thinking about the game Besides it's much better than looking at -10

As for Phoenix, just going by his clips on Youtube. But as I have said before, touch rugby and sevens rugby in warm, sunny weather is a far cry for the beast that is the 13 man code in poor weather at times against teams like Swinton who want to knock your head off haha

In terms of this season when the loans were announced I was very surprised we bagged Lilley. But at that moment I knew we wouldn't keep him longer than the month so keeping him longer wasn't really an option. Realistically we are looking at maybe keeping Jordan-Roberts and Oledzki for longer as Leeds seem fine in these positions for now. So these two we need to integrate more. For the halves I would assume we go with our own guys in Pryce and Keyes, with maybe Thomas and Pheonix covering.

Key person for me at this moment is Moore. But again we have to play a waiting game with him as we don't have a clue what is happening until the 10th March.

One certainty is that no one can say this season isn't going to be 'interesting'. One way or another..

This season isn't going to be interesting.

No, writing it doesn't count.