I was discussing it with a friend the other day about the form of Warrington since Smith has become coach. I was suprised to see Warrington in only 7th. I thought your form had increased to a higher level than that.

Anyway here is the table taken out any points gained upto and including week four, so from week 5 onwards. Obviously to aviod including the Leeds game when Smith had little chance to work with the team and IIRC Lowes was still in charge.

Wigan and Wakey both played 5 games and Bradford and Quins played 3 up until that point.

1. Leeds 34 points.
2. Saints 32 points.
3. Huddersfield 32 points.
4. Hull KR 30 points.
5. Wakefield 26 points.
6. Wigan 26 points.
7. Warrington 24 points.
8. Catalan 24 points.
9. Bradford 24 points.
10. Castleford 22 points.
11. Harlequins 18 points.
12. Hull FC 12 points.
13. Salford 12 points.
14. Celtic 6 points.

(apologise if this has been posted before)

What does it matter. He brought us the Challenge Cup.

Pretty sure Leeds for more than 4 point from thei first 5 games.

Our form under smith was not good in the league as after the hull kr qf game we put all our eggs in the challenge cup basket and wasnt as interested in the league which ended up us losing 6 out of the last 8 games

At least we would have been in the top eight!!!
To be fair to Smith he said right from day one that it would be a long job to get Warrington performing consistently.
The challenge cup this year has been a very nice bonus - next season Warrington MUST be challenging for a top FOUR finish if the club is to move forward.
OH - and we all want to go to Wembley again!

Leeds won four from four so minus 8 from the 42 point total.

To be honest i dont think anything much has changed. weve had a good cup run and played well on cup match days but is that realy down to smith?

in one word yes

How?

if the good CC run is down to TS, then the poor league finish and worst placement for 7 years is also down to TS.

This is what i said myself from day 1 when Tony Smith arrived that in my opinion he would at least 3 years to get us performing consistently and to shape his own squad of players, this is a squad that he mainly inherited.

Becoming consistent doesn`t happen overnight especially when you have been so used to inconsistency, it takes team building over a period of time, structures being put into place and getting the squad to bond together instead of relying on the usual players to bail you out week after week.

Ive seen evidence already that at times we can play as a team and work for each other, occasionally we slip off the rails and back into our old ways especially in defence where we conceded tries far too easily and the intensity seems to drop off from the high levels we have shown previously.

I still expect it to be around another 2 years or so before i will say yeh we can match what Saints and Leeds have been doing for years which is to firsty appear in a grand final and then appear in them on a regular basis, we are a very capable team its just were not consistent and that will take a while to put right.

you could say that, it would take a very harsh person to say that though.
Certainly without including a 'but' at the end of it,


'but, he had to come in and pick up the pieces of what appears to be a very poor pre-season and whatever game plan lowes and team had in place'

blimey give the guy a chance,,he`s been here approx 5 months and we`ve won the challenge cup...course theres been an improvement...we had a terrible start and we picked up under him...lets see what next season brings..

I think it is impossible for a coach to come into a club halfway through a season and make any changes save from those which can be achieved in the short term. The real test will be in the work he does in the pre-season.

Success and failure will be judged at the [ivery[/i end of the 2010 season.

I think it could be viewed as the challenge cup being the only achievable piece of silverware with the superleague being the only achievable method of assessing the depth of squad.

He will know for next season what individuals need to work on so that injuries won't be viewed as an issue 1 because certain players will not be expected to play every single game and 2 any injuries can be covered with confidence.