Quote: Dally "I am not easily pleased. It was the best CC Final I have been to n years. Most have been dross despite what others call quality and creativity. Creativity in the British game is a euphemism for poor defence. Catalans gave it to Warrington and the latter's so called creativity was found wanting. It's not me that easily pleased it people who mistake lots of tries against inept defences as quality that are easily pleased.'"
Not saying other recent finals have been quality so a nothing point really. Doesn’t need to be lots of tries to make a quality game. You’ve really come up with one area of one teams performance to say the game was great, nothing on Warrington. One team defending well isn’t enough on its own to make a game great and their defence wasn’t even as good as made out. They had 26 missed tackles by HT, god knows what it was at FT but will have been way too high for the praise it’s getting. They were let off by poor opposition. Roberts make a break downfield in the first half on the first tackle instead of holding on against a scattered defence he tries a wonder ball and it’s ruled forward. Gigot failed with a high ball and Warrington think it’s a free play and mess it up. Both of those are a combination of Catalans failures and Warrington messing up in capitalising. Wire should have scored through Lineham but a Warrington runner makes a sloppy error of running to the outside shoulder instead of inside shoulder of the defender, harsh rule but one that professionals should know not to do. Lineham trying slide over from 6/7m our first tackle again sloppy when he should e cut back inside. Westwood could’ve scored but again poor execution of the pass. Numerous last tackle plays where the ball was thrown behind Brown or around his head costing him time to get a better kick away when near Catalans line.
For all the talk of Catalans defence being good, any team whose composure was higher than Warrington’s which was about a 1 out of 10 would’ve won. If Catalans defence was so good why did Warrington have so many chances, more so than them. Especially considering completion rates which should’ve seen Catalans boss the 2nd half as they held onto the ball which resulted in Warrington having to do more defending equalling more fatigue and starting sets in poorer positions