spot on if nothing else as you say Mr Smith has unfinished business so long may he reign.......

One win away from another CCF appearance, 1 point away from the LLS and 40mins away from being crowned Champions. A few bits of luck, decisions, of whatever, could have seen us win the treble! There is only Wigan who can rival us for that this year, overall, despite falling just short, I see the season as another towards consitant success and where we aim to be as a club.

For you to qualify how we did this season, you also need to look at what would have been the minimum targets at the beginning of the season.

I think they would be Top three finish in the league, last four in one of the competitions and last two in the other.

We met all of the targets there, so I would say that was a good season, not a great one.

But if you don't want to judge a season on silverware, then what were the performances like?

I'd say there were only a handful of games where we were at the top our game. Most league games this season were fairly dull and lacked intensity. We struggled at times during matches but most of the time still come out on top. This says more for the current standard of the rest of the league than it does for us.

Again on this basis, I'd say a good season, not a great one.

This .....unfortunately

As we know, success in sport is measured on trophies and unfortunately we brought nothing home in 2013. I don't buy into the idea that because we got to the semi final of CC and to OT to contest the SL final that this season has been so 'great'. Although, yes, in retrospect, it could have been worse.

For me it's a similar feeling to what I had when Leeds dumped us out in 2011. I honestly thought we'd get the job done on Saturday, and that we had learnt from last season. Although it's important to note that i enjoyed 2012 much more in general. As for the match itself, I realise there was adversity with injury but we worked hard to build a lead and always had 13 players on the pitch to defend it. Instead, it was complete capitulation. I also think that Wigan knew our defensive frailties (which have been on show a few times this season) and that these may give them a path back into the match. And so it proved! Hats off to them though, it was a big comeback and one I wasn't overjoyed to witness.

2014 marks to beginning of a small rebuild and should be interesting to see how it all pans out. I'm actually looking forward to it. From a positive perspective, those that leave are creating opportunities for others to thrive and I'll always trust TS's judgement.

Finally, I felt very sorry for the boys who are leaving us with a grand final loss too. They've all been terrific servants and justified an opportunity to bow out in style. Not to be.