I would go further. I would invite you into the changing room on Saturday and let you have a second go and ask the players if any of them disagree with what you say.

I make it 09.30 am. Powell should have gone by now-Nothing on the offical website

I find it hard to see how Powell can recover from this. He clearly has no fresh ideas and no formula for making this team successful. I don't believe the players respond to him and the last 14 pages show the fans don't support him either. If DH needs any more ammunition to fire a coach, I'd like to hear it.

Too early days imo. Remember, if DH wants rid he will have to pay up RP's contract (and then probably pay a lot more for a replacement).

I think he has until the end of March (unless we get thrashed by Cas in which case DH may feel he has to make a move).

He could sack him for BOC, he's the opposite of a coach.

Powell signed a two year deal which expires at the end of the year. It would not cost much to get rid. If we can afford to keep Hickey on the books, we can afford that. Pleading poverty for not getting rid is unacceptable.

I just saw the highlights on the SL website. I can see why people get jacked off about our defence.

I never say this normally, but there are occasions when you don't tell people back home the truth about some players as sometimes they are average over here then go on and do well there and vice versa.

But i think just by watching that 5 min video that there's a player who was wasn't known for his defence over here. Just watch the vid and you can see who our spot player certainly is. No doubt for every side we play this year will also pick him. They went his way a lot.

From a quick 5 min vid job it shows we are:-

26" ineffective tackle (6) led to line break TRY
46" dead marine (7) left one man at marker, they scoot and get good yards heading to the tramline
1'05" poor read (7) creates overlap and line break TRY
1'24" player (6) has to attempt tackle. Centre (4) is in no man's land thanks to good Salford numbers. Line break. This must have been on last tackle as the winger had dropped back.
2'00" dead marine (12) would have made it to A or B where the try was scored. Also (20) has back turned to play. TRY. Lots of contact from Dummy Runners in this try.
2'19" more contact from dummy runners.
2'36" centre (3) is in no mans' land. Salford have numbers again. TRY. Have to question. Where is the full back who should be spreading his players out???
3'01" dead marine (6) leaves gap. Simple case of numbers from that point. TRY.
3'15" missed tackle (16) then slow to get back to marker >
3'35" (16) missed tackle again. 2nd in set!
3'43" poor defensive read (4) makes tackle late and allows offload and try despite there being nothing on there as we have the numbers.
3'49" one missed tackle from player at marker, other player slow and not square at marker. Salford player runs at him. He is called off by the ref. In this scenario I would rather he'd made the tackle deliberately giving away a penalty as it was on their 20.
4'08" player (9) rushes out and misses tackle
4'15" player (3) is slightly impeded by a dummy runner. This creates the whole for them to run into. Winger then caught out in front of ball! They go from not having enough numbers to having them.
4'30 our winger (2) not only runs into their player (7). Attempts it for a second time and draws in their A marker for us to score.

We are slow getting up from tackles, on a couple of occasions there was only one man ready at marker. We are weak around the tram lines. The backs need to be doing extras at training.

On a positive not we do seem to get numbers in the tackle, but mainly only up the middle. A conclusion based on only 5 mins of one game is that in that game our forwards appear to defend ok. The backs have trouble.

Having said all this, Salford were superb on getting numbers into the right position. Looking at the tries, they often had an overlap.

One thing I do notice is that there seems to be a lot more players that get away with making contact with people after being a dummy runner. A couple of those tries wouldn't have been given if they were in the NRL.



I'll wake you all up when I'm finished!

Spot on Rooster. No's 3, 4 and 6 out. Oh yes, that's JOC, Howell and Witt - a quarter of our missed tackles.

Several others with a rocket up their .

Something needs to change!

drop as many backs as you like, that won't solve the problem of the forwards playing like girls. 1-17 we are very poor apart from 1 or 2 exceptions, simply judging performances on the number of missed tackles is silly IMO.

drop as many backs as you like, that won't solve the problem of the forwards playing like girls. 1-17 we are very poor apart from 1 or 2 exceptions, simply judging performances on the number of missed tackles is silly IMO.

Sorry double post.

Indeed. Observations based on a five minute vid of tries scored is not an accurate indication of the whole game or indeed season. However, there seemed to be a couple of concurrent themes in the tries conceded against Salford.

Sadly no. 3 was supporters' player of the year last season, no. 4 has been well-known as an ineffective tackler ever since he came back from his serious arm injury (tendon separation wasn't it?) and no. 6 has always been a defensive liability - I well remember being slagged off by one "expert" on here when I pointed this out during the general celebrations when we signed him.

Jeez ....you mean he already had a reputation as a bad tackler? Im shocked that we signed him then seeing as we have such a poor defensive record already. May as well have just kept Sargy there and signed a youngster as a backup. Wonder who made the decision to go for him. Witt was always good as an attacking/kicking player at Crusaders getting lots of praise.

JOC always gets credit from the supporters because of his effort. Still not got the hang of defensive positioning and tackling.