Made me think Radford is more of a clown than ever. You want to find out if youngsters are good enough you have to play them with some of the best players, not just lump them all together and say ah well they are not good enough. It's complete none sense from the off. The donny and York games should have been mixed sides IMO

Not that well. The starting six pack if fit pick themselves. Bench is more challenging. Of the rest Thompson has played himself in, definitely for me. Whiting looked OK, but probably will get a few games at Donny first. Neither Bowden nor Green are creating enough impact IMO, Feka does but defence not brilliant, thought he'd get more minutes yesterday tbh. Personally I'd play Houghton for 80 and have Thompson, Feka, Bowden and Rankin on the bench. Not sure where Hadley is in the pecking order. BTW impressed me at the Keepmoat. Hmm..

I sort of agree and wanted to see the full side play yesterday but the seasons a marathon and not a sprint and we don't want to peak too early if we can even peak at all lol.

Trouble is, is .....

Curtis Naughton, Tom Lineham, Joe Arundel, Jack Logan, Callum Lancaster, Jordan Abdull, Marc Sneyd, Josh Bowden, James Cunningham, Chris Green, Gareth Ellis, Dean Hadley, Jordan Thompson

such a bad side?

And 3 first teamers as subs if you include Whiting.

Bowden hits very hard in defence, putting in one big hit especially. But for some reason he doesn't have the same impact going forward. Green was below his usual averageness and Cunningham still looks a year off to me.
If I was Radford I'd be very tempted to play Thompson at prop, he was very good at 13 on Sunday and looked really strong.
I said it a couple of months ago and I'll say it again, Bobby Tyson-Wilson will be ahead of both Bowden & Green by seasons end, especially Green.

Fine, but these players were given a fair chance to impress for selection.
Many times Radford has told the players (regardless of who they are) that they will have the chance to prove themselves and fight for a place in the team selection.

So who of those who played, would you deny that same opportunity?

But you can't prove yourself when you're being swamped by a superior team. Compare us against Wigan last year..Abdull Green Logan Bowden Hadley all in the starting 13 with Cunningham on the bench..tell me how impressive they were compared to the regulars?
At this stage of the season it's ridiculous to once again be under prepared, to have a situation where some of the starting 17 won't have had more than 40 minutes game time 3 weeks leading up to the Hudds game..that's just crazy.

I am not denying any of them, it is great they are playing. However, me personally would have played more of the first team and then played abdul, Logan Lancaster and turgut amongst them. Only then can you see how good they are in the right sphere. I don't ascribe to this way of thinking but we have already heard quotes "at least we know our backups / kids are not as good as we thought" IMO we gained nothing at all from that match.

Because it just feels like the same old same old, from walking away from the kc against rovers, with that same old feeling, to listening to Radford talk after the wakefield friendly, it is demoralizing. I know both friendly games, but Im starting to think its going to be another season like last! and the thought of that is demoralizing, hope im wrong

It's a whole lot healthier not to be p!ssed off now and p!ssed off later.
Think positive now then you can be totally p!ssed off later.

Fair comment, let's hope we are all proven wrong .
I also think we are going to struggle to make the 8 . SL looks very strong this season .
Let's get behind the Club and hopefully we can come good.

Thanks for the replies. Obviously I didn't go hence the question but I agree with your assessments on these players and the Thompson to prop aspect. He played there for a while at the start of last year and did well but ultimately faded in later games until he was moved wider. Props tend to get better with age and it's a tough place to play but I have concerns over Bowden and Green. They need to make a step up this year in terms of consistency. Not sure what to make of Cunningham as yet - has hardly pulled up any trees in pre season.

one thing sunday's game showed is that houghton will be asked to play a lot of minutes, possibly the full 80 as we do not really have any effective back up. i suspect he will try howarth ahead of cunningham, but neither look up to the task. the only other option is putting rankin on the bench as a utility man

Can see us putting Rankin on the bench, bringing him on in the halves and moving Sneyd to 9. Something I'd like to avoid, Sneyd is hardly a rock in defence (he's a HB, so he doesn't need to be).

my gut tells me the Radford expected his selection to be far more competitive than they were... I believe he underestimated the quality of Wakefield's squad and ended up disappointed.