Personally i think we will put Bradford to the sword quite easily. Their league position has been flatterd by their home advantage of bring used to playing on a midden of a pitch, that isnt even legal within the laws of the game.
Our full size pitch with superior playing surface and a squad that should be fitter and better coached will see them off quite comfortably.
Home advantage at their dump may be a tougher ask though.

The only memories I have of Odsal is being near hypothermic the entire time.

I agree. We are going to be playing a lot of teams targeting us. They are coming as underdogs and we know how that helps a team.
We'll need to play to our best every week if we want that GF win.

We will and that’s a good thing imo. Look how it’s benefitted Leigh. They entered SL with a swagger and a winning mentality and it’s served them well.

I don’t think we need to win every game and I doubt we will as it’s a tougher league than two years ago, but I think we must make ourselves the team to beat.

Correct me if I am wrong , but finishing top of the league gives you a massive advantage in that every play off game is at home including the final. Therefore that must be our target to finish top.

Not long back we met Bradford in a SL game at home when they were on a 9 match losing streak and we were on a good run of consecutive wins.
We lost. It's the Wakefield way. Lets not count our chickens just yet.

One read of this forum and I’d say hardly any fans are ‘counting their chickens’. If anything there’s plenty of acknowledgement it will be a tough league this season.

We do need to display some confidence though. Confidence with caution is how we should be.

The first few games we need to put a marker down and show that we mean business.

Nobody can argue that, it’s been the pattern for most of the last fifty years.

One of the Ellis/Powell regimes most important aims has to be to dispel that culture.

I too am sick to death of Trinity sides coming out like rabbits caught in the headlights in these sort of games. Twenty minutes in and the game is lost, but with a tiny little burst at the end just to show what could have been. Frustration city, we’ve all been there.

With all the fireworks and the hype and a full house this has all the potential for a massive flop. At the end of the day Bradford have nothing to lose and that’s hard to fight.

But it’s a brave new era, and we owe it to the club to trust them with our confidence.

One thing most of us will agree is that despite the cheap tickets and the new stand, a good win against Bradford and the rest will be the thing that really gets the Wakefield public interested. Do that and it creates its own momentum.

If nothing else, it is at least exciting. Something we haven’t really seen for five years, or maybe not since 2004..

This week's Reader's Poll in League Express is...
"Which of last year's play-off teams will pose the biggest threat to Wakefield Trinity's likely dominance of the Championship ?"
Bradford
Fev
Sheffield
Toulouse
York.

So they've obviously got us down as favourites !!

Any bookies odds yet for the championship?

I think you'd have request a bet for that. No ones really going to be doing odds on Championship online. Local bookies might.

quite a few usually have match betting available online and Sky I'm sure last year had championship winner odds and top try scorer

Challenge cup odds are out and we are quoted 50/1 which is quite complimentary considering.
We are also the highest ranked championship team with Fev next at 100/1.

If betting for championship comes out this suggest we will be clear favourites by short odds.

I don’t think you quite get the advantage staying full time gets you. The last 5 competitive years in the Championship, the full time team finishes 1st. 100%. If there are two full time teams, they finish 1st and 2nd. 100%. Playoffs are a different matter (see last season…) but basically you’re in a head to head with Toulouse over 1st & 2nd place. All the part time teams will take points off each other fighting for third.