very happy , entertaining and good rugby, this weekend showed we could potentially beat a form team with a few of our big hitters out of the team.

I think we can only go up from here .

On the Monaghan point I believe he is playing much better of late, including on Sunday.

look at that great minds and all that.....
we could be twins like Danny Devito and Arnie....

His biggest achievement IMO was getting shut of Gleeson and managing to get £100k for him in the process

His second biggest is getting Briers almost into line, although my guess is that their 'relationship' will be fairly short lived.

Nice one Tony lad

After the quins game i was thinking you could pretty much write our season off.

Now, i'm quite positive and looking forward to each game alot more than i was before.

I genuinely think we have a great chance in the challange cup and i think we should easily make the play-offs.

Sunday's game for me was a blip, silly penalties, a couple of dodgy ref calls and we still only lost by 8 points.

Roll on the next game.

At least we can see progress is being made, young players are coming on. Having no relegation is good it has taken the pressure off and is allowing us to build, the results are not that important to me at the moment, its more important that we develop players and have something in place for next season. If we start putting things together towards the end of the season, go on a good run and nick 7th or 8th place then we can have a good shot at whoever we get in the playoffs and finish our season on a credible note. Ditto with the Challenge Cup.

People were saying 3 months ago at losing was easier to take if the players had put the effort in....

Well it seems we're at that stage now.

You can see what he is implementing, albeit the changes are quite slight. I can't see us breaking any pots this season, for the simple reason Che hasn't had an off season with the squad. I would like to think we will be a more complete unit next season.

In smith we trust

The Messiah

Like everyone said if we put effort in and lose were not fussed at least there trying. Which is showing with the fans on sunday

Smith's also got the fans onside at the moment with all this Smith revolution, Che Smith stuff, I reckon he's got a few more months of that before he starts to lose favour and the first Smith out brigade emerges on the forum. At Leeds they started in his third season but that was because they won Super League and the World Club Challenge and got to two finals in his second year delaying the critics.

Nobody has been talking about the World Cup recently and how it was supposedly Smith's fault that we lost to the Aussies and Kiwis because the Saints and Leeds players didn't talk to each other in the dinner queue or something.

i guess its 3 forward and 2 back but at least we are making progress. Not until TS has had the chance to bring in players to fill the positions where he thinks we are weak will we get a true reflection of where we are. After all, he is working with another coaches squad.
I would think that if we made the play offs from where we are now then we would all be happy. A cup run would be a bonus.
We all have our own views about who should come and go - let's wait until season end and see if what TS does corresponds with what we would like to see happen

I don't think patience will run out for a long time yet. Most people, well those who's knee joints don't go beyond the vertical, appreciate we are a work in progress, regardless of what our squad has achieved previously.

The World Cup was a major disappointment, but I would like to think Smith learnt a hell of a lot about bringing warious factions together, I would go as far to say I will stand us, as a club in good stead.

Quite right, and it says alot about our change in fortune as i was totally gutted we lost! Rather than a few months it would have been "oh typical" and "not again" or even "Oh well, always next year "

I agree. I think the honeymoon period will last at least 1/4 of the way through the 2010 season when expectation will be sky high, with good reason too.

No complaints from me! As most people have pointed out, steady progress can be seen, things are being shaken up etc.

Considering my gloomy outlook 2 games in, I'm much cheerier about the season now!