I guess that ultimately the players are always responsible for their performances but surely it goes beyond that? 2 coaches could get completely different performances from the same players so the coach has to have an influence. I'd say the better the coach the greater the influence so if radford is having little influence either way then maybe that says a lot about his coaching capabilities.

If he is bawling players out in front of others it confirms one of my concerns about him pre season

And one coach can get two completely different performances from the same players. Does he tell them to play cr@p one week and really go for it the next ? Or even tell them to go 16-0 up then chuck it all before the end of the game?

Of course the coach has influence but many on here want Tony Smith who was relegated with a poor Hudds side, did great work with Leeds and to start with Wire but is suffering this season because he's lost some serious talent particularly his general. Brian Mac didn't pull any trees up at London but is the main man now. I wonder what the difference there was ? Maybe he couldn't 'influence' his London players.

1 shaul
2 lineham
3 crooks
4 Sa
5 talonoa

This is as good as most teams barring Leeds
The forwards are pretty up there too with lots of youth in it with plenty of improvement in them.
Think tweaks along with some young players to come through and hopefully make the grade then we'll not be far off a good team pretty soon. But a 7 a good 1 ties it altogether. At the very least two average 'organising' halves. We've a runner in rankin and Miller doesn't really appear to be either without a particularly good kicking game between them. That leaves Horne but he's short term and always likely to miss games.

Decent back-line when Lineham and Sa come in.
Decent pack though Carvell looks like he'll be out more out than in.
But until we sort out the half back situation we'll be playing Donny and Featherstone next year when the leagues split.
If AP has any cash left he needs to splash the cash on a scrum half.

I'm almost certain he doesn't tell them to do that, but the fact that they [iare[/i doing it has to be, at least in part, down to the way he's preparing/managing them.

All we heard in the off season was how the players had the man they wanted in charge, how they were all going to play for him, and how the embarrassing defeats and poor attitudes were going to be a thing of the past. The reality, however, has been quite different to how the pre-season rhetoric indicated it would be.

I can't shake the feeling that we have another Richard Agar situation. The owner and (some) fans will call for him to be given time regardless of the poor results and lack of improvement in key areas, until we're in a situation that'll take years to recover from. There's a very real chance we could finish outside of the top 8 after sacking a coach who achieved two top 6 finishes and a cup final. Personally, I hope Pearson realises he's made a big mistake sooner rather than later and sets about trying to rectify it.

Pearson didn't like the way the club was being run behind the scenes apparently. He seems to prefer a more strict regime that the laid-back approach that Gentle oversaw. And despite some bad results at home this year our nilling at Wembley and total annihilation in the disgraceful play off debacle last year must at least in part have been of Gentle's making to use your own argument. Pearson seems to want to give Radford the finance to remove many of the players from the squad who played in those games which can only be done over time. That's where it differs from Agar in that Agar wasn't given any financial backing by the then owners as became apparent later.

I'm not sure whether Radford will make it as a top level coach - too many rough edges at the moment - but the club needs new players more than it needs a new coach right now.

Or radford had his own agenda at the back end of last season and was leading a revolt ha who knows!!! But he his our coach now! Oh and we wouldn't of won on Sunday with a decent 7, it's ridiculous comment, we where woefu right across the park, it was down to attitude and desire, and not been properly prepared, a good coach would have us playing for 80 mins, win or lose that's all you can ask for

Walsh would have made little difference to the result on Sunday.

We lost because we stopped tackling.

Did Walsh play for Saints when Widnes beat them?

I'm sure it was, but we definitely won't even be at Wembley this year, and there's a decent chance we won't be in the play-offs either. As disappointing as those results under Gentle were, it has to be better to lose a final/play off game (even in humiliating fashion), than not to be there at all.

There's also rumours that the end of season form was down to some sort of player revolt (again). I don't know how much truth there is in that, but it wouldn't surprise me either way.



I disagree. I think we need both equally. The players we have should be doing finishing at least as high as Gentle got them in his two seasons in charge if Radford is a better man for the job. It looks unlikely that they'll do that. Of course we need better players to get above the seemingly self-imposed 'glass ceiling' of 6th place, but we can bring in all the new players we like and they still won't do as well as they can without the right man leading them.

Nope. Wasn't in the 19-man squad. Why?

At 16-0 up after an hour and in control despite not being particularly threatening in attack (and obviously despite being not 'properly prepared' according to you) we just needed to close the game out. Good players do that. With the forward dominance we had early in the second half our playmakers should have created more and we should have been further in front. No one stepped up into Westy's role and that was disappointing as he is essentially playing the role of a playmaking half at times.

I take your other points but I don't agree with this personally. What's the point of being there if you serve up junk on the big stage ?

This is a ridiculous comment if you think an on field general or leader playmaker wouldn't of made a difference. Have you never ever watched good teams and good half's play the game?
When we conceded the first try and when emotions where running high a good half would of got everyone together, would of dictated what he wanted, all but placed the ball into forwards hands and kicked smart and all but broke his neck to make sure the ball was turned over deep in the opposition half.
It wasn't rocket science and it wasn't a hard task to implement yet somehow we still failed
Westy isn't a half but nearest to an on field general we had Sunday. 16 up whilst on we lost when off. So to say a good half or game manager wouldn't have mattered is ridiculous in my opinion

Because it's an achievement to get to a final, at which point you're only 80 minutes away from lifting a trophy. I agree that it's totally unacceptable to perform like we did in those two games, but, when we're assessing how successful a coach has been, you'd have to say that one who gets us to a final or into a play off off place is better than one who does not.

With the play-offs particularly, if we've finished in, say, 6th place, that shows a level of consistency throughout the season that has enabled us to finish in that position. It's horrible to limp out as we did, but it surely has to be better than finishing 9th after the weekly rounds.

You are Stevo and I claim my fiver.