Aye the younger ones are coming into their own now.

Wire fan here. Very good game today - Bulls were the better team by some distance, and very unlucky not to win.

Ah van had a shocker IMO, and so you were effectively a man down and still dominated. Diskin was absolutely outstanding, as was Elima.

Crookes has definitely matured as a player this season, he is ready to go to the next level imo.

Agree with OP, apart from the change in playing staff what we actually lost over the last years has been a 'culture' that had been at Odsal since forever. In this group of young homegrown forwards we have the prospect of re-establishing that grittyness that made us feared. We're just one 'brute' short of really kicking on.

Be interesting to see the stats as I thought when Koppy was on we were well on top of their props. I know Graham backed up and looked tired but Koppy stood out against LMS and Perry. Donno, Elliot, Olbison and Crookes all did a great shift in the conditions and there's lots to be enthusiastic about.

If I was to pick something out it was the fluency of the ball movement for Sts betwen halves, centres, Flannery and Wilkin. It was different league to ours.

I don't remember Ah Van missing any tackles?

A couple of handling errors and a kick that should have been made but I thought he was very good.

Dropped alot of ball yesterday though Ah Van. At one point when we were pressuring their line in the second half the guy in front of me said "don't give it to Ah Van" - dropped ball. Was getting predictable. He wasn't the only one though, we did seem to drop more ball than them.

There was a spell justa fter 60 minutes when they put some great passages together but to no avail. The conditions certainly suited Bradford better who are going to have to grind results out before they start playing open rugby.

Yep he looked like a proper SL player on that display. He’s quick on his feet, makes ground in contact and looked safe under pressure. He has put some muscle on too. Hope he continues to do well.



I thought he had a bit of a mare to begin with with the dropped ball and then subsequently giving a penalty away but he then seemed to get up to speed and made some decent runs and was solid defensively. Much better than recent efforts.


Yeah I reckon a Puletua type player would really make our pack something special. Like you I did think Koppy looked good, he seemed to make ground easily. The Saints fluency was impressive, hopefully we’ll be able to improve ours to that extent with a settled side. I did think that in attack at least we looked better with Briggs if not defensively.



I thought he started well but it went a bit wrong in the second half when he lost a lot of ball. A couple of times he flew out of the line in defence and missed which he was lucky not to be punished for.

Lestrange played less than 5 minutes so we were def a man down. Ah Van did drop a couple but to say we were effectively a man down is harsh.

AH Van tackled his nuts off. He works overtime taking us forward too, always makes a good 10m and draws 2+ tackles in every time. Yeah he dropped the ball about 3 times in a row, but think he was exhausted.

Crookes i'm still a little unsure, looks good in attack. Improved under high ball too. Still needs somework defensively. But defintely looks better.

We've discussed this before but there's genuine sense of a foundation emerging upon which 2/3 key players added would make a massive difference - not a huge overall but I totally agree vis a vis Puletua. I guess you also have figure in the risk though. Perry was heralded as big signing from the NRL and looked poor and Cross looks ordinary at Leeds. On the halves I'm defo a Briggs man even though I think there's lot of work to be done I just think he moves with more intent and attacking threat and the ball moves quicker and smoother to the flanks.

On Ah Van after a really good run he coughed the ball and missed tackles all game.

How does that make any sense? at the begging you said we was deffo a man down, at the end you said but to say we were effectively a man down is a bit harsh.

he means that to say we were a man down due to ah van having a bit of a mare was harsh. fact that we were effectively a man down due to l'estranges injury is a seperate point.

Read the context you plum

The other guy said that with ah van's mistakes we were like playing with a man down.

Cheers matthew