The coach doesn’t come up with poor reads in defence and consistently pass the ball totally inaccurately, put the ball out on the full regularly.

The errors he is making are not complex they are very basic skills.

If it was Jai Field making the same mistakes he would be crucified.

I believe at the moment Smith and Powell are killing us with their failure to control/direct play, their passing accuracy and their lack of threat.

I'm not disagreeing with you (although I still think there's a decent player there), but Lam keeps sending him out there week after week, regardless of performance or improvements. Hanley had a very solid game Vs Hudds and that was the opportunity to move JH back to 6.

He's killing us with stuff like that and I think he's killing the players too.

I agree I think Hanley played well and was surprised not to see him play tonight given the form of our halves.

What concerns me about Lam is the fact he has been bigging up Smith trying to justify the Hastings to 1 move despite the fact he had been poor.

Spot on, to TL. At least Harry Smith tries to be creative, (see Liam Marshalls 2nd try)., and does have failings in his game, but someone tell me what TL brings to the team to avoid criticism that HS receives ?

That's one of my main gripes wth Lam. He seems unable/unwilling to change course, stubborn even. The Hastings @FB thing is just one example. His selection of Clubb and non selection of Clarke is another. We don't even need to talk about Hankinson either.

I said it a few weeks ago but it’s clearly a pure lack of confidence and/or belief in what he’s being asked to do. The Harry Smith we’re seeing now isn’t the one that burst onto the scene.

As it happens I agree with your Jai Field point.

Tommy needs dropping ASAP. JH into the halves and Hanley FB.

I felt bad for Smith tonight, I know someone mentioned about being behind a beaten pack, I didnt think that was an issue tonight, but you had a very rigid plan of attack, going at our right edge, and some of his passes, and passes to him weren't accurate.

Not as bad as the game at your place.

Meanwhile leuluai was nowhere to be seen

Just as an aside, wtf were you doing going down our right, we had a prop with crap cardio on the left

Needs a few weeks out the fire and has done for a while. I feel for him, as having to play on the back of that front row all season is enough to ruin any young halves career but he’s also playing under Lam and when you add them together, he’s on a hiding to nothing.

I just hope he can bounce back from this season because once your confidence goes as a young halfback and you have a tough time, it’s not easy to bounce back.

People getting on a rookie half back whose being asked to run the show.

Yet our experienced captain goes has been missing all year.

Weird.

Harry is not the main problem for me.
If we put a fullback at full back and our best half in the halves then it may help him a little. We could also have took the pressure off his kicking by letting Hastings kick. He has no threat by his side bothhTommy or Powell offer almost nothing to open teams up. You can get away with them if you have French out the back along with Hastings as a playmaker but it would be better if we only had one bon at a time for me. I'm fine with Powell at hooker for 80, if we had French Hastings and maybe field. Though can you imagine if we ha a little more from 9.
I thought Singleton played well if anything the forwards laid more than enough to play behind

Yes Tommy was poor.

Tommy has earned his stripes though and still controls the game.

Smith does very little organising.

Smith is 21. He’s had a year in SL I’ve yet to see him string any quality performances together.

He looks totally lost all I see him as being is a link man. Halves need to do more than just pass the ball to the other half to boss it.

Seems to me .like for most of the season we've been saying, what can you expect from halves playing behind a beaten pack, but that refrain doesn't really hold true for the last two games, does it, where we have had plenty of field position. What threat do we pose when we get to or opponents' 20? Not much. Smith put in a couple of accurate kicks, and we got a few set-restarts, but it didn't amount to much. We don't scare opposing defences. i'm not convinced Smith is any better than Hampshire, say, right now, but it's certainly true that he has had an unrealistic burden.

We don't pose any threat from two of our three starting halves from tonight's team but Smith at least does on occasion. With our best half at full back and without our main cutting edge French out the back we are seeing our issues highlighted. The pack was decent tonight but have not been for most of the season. The sharpness of our plays will take some time to cluck. Now we have a platform to play behind I'm hoping Field, Bateman, Zak and Gildart and Marshall getting game time will help a little over next few weeks. You may then see Smith find life a little easier than it's been in a team without backs and a beaten pack.

Lam has completely wasted a year of Smith's development by not playing him alongside Hastings

Tommy was a passenger in that game last night. Literally watching the ball go by. There was a few times I clocked him just strutting round watching Hastings run laterally. He did nothing, offered nothing and looked like he couldn’t be bothered in all honesty. He wasn’t in control of that game in any way whatsoever. To be blunt I don’t know who was.

I think you’re being harsh on Smith, whilst I can see where you’re coming from and you make some good points, there’s far too many other circumstances preventing him being the half he can be. The grand master of them all is one Adrian Lam.