The catalans players stopped. He wouldn't have scored

Once again, a poor first half killed us, but Catalan were very strong today.

What I couldn't understand was why Kyle Wood turned his back and ducked when charging down the drop-goal. I wouldn't like a ball kicked into my face but he actually got out of the way of the ball.

Top 5 isn't out of the way yet. Saints could do us a favour tomorrow by putting a big score past Cas, which would put us back in 5th, and Hull's points difference is so bad that if we win the next game and they lose we'd go fourth. Every team has a rough patch, but we can't keep giving away big first half leads.

Whatever the frustration, I'd rather be us than a Wigan or Leeds fan this year.

Funny how people were moaning and groaning when brough was announced as our new signing ,now he’s our go to man .Max’s one one one tackle was as good as I’ve seen and his performance bar that blip was first class. When we shift the ball about we go places but the one man pedestrian rugby which we played in the first half cramps our style and play and the dragons could deal with that all day .Too many unforced errors and lack of cohesion in first half again cost us a very winnable game again.

After a poor first half in which we still seemed hung over from last week, the second 40 was massively better and the game swung on 2 things.
First off, the two forward passes, our "try" chalked off and the Catalan effort allowed to stand.
FWIW, the call on ours was correct but, the Catalan effort was more forward, an absolute shocker from the officials.
But, THE biggest moment was from the Batchelor break. There was good support either side and we should have capitalised on that effort, which due to how much on top we were at the time, would very likely have allowed us to seal the game, even though there was still a long way to go.

We also had a position to go for a DG but, lacked the organisation and ability to go for it.

The Fifita injury is a huge worry.
He and Brough are the two players who can win games for us and we just have to hope that his injury is not too serious but, he didn't look great.

Overall though a massive improvement against a very god Catalan side and I believe that we can certainly push for a play off spot.

Feel a huge frustration as a supporter at the moment over the close games that haven’t gone our way. There was just so much promise of a big year at the start of the season and we can’t yet write off the chance of achieving something top 5 wise or in the cup.

The players we lost long term have been massive losses and our whole game plan has gone out of the window. For the returning players you can’t just expect them to slot straight back in so Miller is getting some unfair stick in my opinion. Same with players who’ve come in - Junior Sau is here to plug a hole until BT returns.

We’re going to have to do it extremely tough at Saints next week and then Leeds at home we cannot afford a balls up.

top 5 is gone mate- surely we have London covered still they cant win 5 more games can they?

What a frustrating spectacle that was - and where these slow, lethargic starts come from is an absolute mystery; I don't know how you fix that, but it needs fixing - we keep giving ourselves too much to do in the second half.

I too thought Miller was poor - but then I don't think him and Hampshire are a good match; too similar. Max Jowitt was head and shoulders MoTM - and I put a significant part of the blame for that drop on BJB - they confused each other when it needed a strong call one way or the other.

Super frustrating to see yet another try awarded for a blatant forward pass; everyone in the stadium and the TV studio spotted it - but 4 match officials, who's actual job it is to do so, failed to; embarrassing.

Strange how people are selective in their criticism.If it had been Lynne or Miller ,for example ,who had not passed the ball for a certain try all hell would have broken loose on this forum and others.
Hardly a word though about Batchelor’s holding on to the ball .

You are right Beagle about batch not passing .Makes you think that a lot of people on this forum have ever seenWakefield

It definitely isn't - we've still got 13 games left and 26 points to play for, so miles to go in this season yet. We've also seen that the teams just above us Hull, Cas and Catalans are consistently inconsistent, so it's up to us to pull our finger out and start these games with a bit more aggression and intensity. We went through a few loses last year around this time and managed to turn the season around somewhat with a few key wins and we need to do the same again. Hopefully as we get back to nearly full strength we can discover some good form again.

wigan will finish higher than us this year

The oracle has spoken.

What a shame we couldn't have played tonight's Catalan team!

Still amazed at how Hull could concede 55 on Saturday and then come up with 51.

Thought exactly the same myself.

A few of us Cas fans watched it together. Gobsmacked. How does Radders explain that away?