Didn't tnotice Paea come on so ften so my mistake - any news on Bowden? I pointed out he was hurt straight away and he looked in agony.

I think Paea had to play more than he is currently up to becasue of that, he did a fair bit of puffing - but when fresh he made yards

Disagree about Yeaman - yes he was the same old Yeamo in attack, but defensively I thought he was outstanding. Their right centre was in his pocket for most of the game.

I don't think we're that far away tbh. We're playing some attractive attacking rugby and defensively we're getting better. Hopefully things will click in both departments sooner rather than later.

Ellis had a great game (still can't understand the penalty for a forearm when he clearly handed the guy off with his, well, hand). For someone who hadn't played properly for a while, I thought Colbon looked ok too. Not sure on Crooks. I think we're suffering from second season syndrome as much as he is. We expect him to be as good as he was last year, but oppo teams will be watching him closely because he was so good. BTW, could any physicists on here explain how you can knock a ball on when hit in a heavy tackle, when the ball flies out backwards at high speed (almost as if punched out)? The decision against Crooks on that occasion was baffling. not that it will make any difference, but I'd like to see the replay of the tackle that laid Crooks out too.

I thought Shenton looked good, but tbf Crooks and Colbon kept Carney very quiet.

Disappointing, but it wasn't a "we played crap so the oppo didn't need to bother too much to win" game. I thought Cas looked solid and will do well this year.

I'd like to see Rankin FB, Arundel CE and Miller SH getting starting spots next week.

disagree on this point slightly - I think your kicking kept Carney FAIRLY quiet. He is nullified when having to return the ball from our in-goal, which wasn't uncommon yesterday.

He still made nearly 200m though on the SL website so he wasn't particularly stifled by Crooks and Colbon - and his three catches at the end were unbelievable (especially against taller guys) and won us the game IMO

Crooks should be dropped and locked in a gym for a month. His lack of physicality caused us all sorts of problems yesterday, as well as some poor positioning defensively. He reminded me at times of Craig Hall :/

In attack he doesn't seem to run the ball in with any aggression, and his stance is way too upright instead of leaning his weight into the tackle. Defenders can easily absorb the impact and get underneath him. This happened twice just yesterday and caused knock-ons at key times.

Defensively, Shenton managed to get on his outside way too often and in the tackle he loses the impact through going way too high on the attacker. Those stats someone put on earlier say it all really.

That channel has become a weak point in our line and sides will exploit it for fun.

Quite a scathing assessment, but he needs a kick up the .

Those two doing 'okay' probably contributed the most to us losing yesterday.

I don't think he was showing Shenton the outside at all, I think he found himself out of positition at times and had to scramble to make up for it losing vital yards. The result of this was a fairly quick play the ball for Cas, our defensive line on the back foot, not set and resulting in a break or a penalty elsewhere.

Completely agree.

One thing I will say though, is there was no way Carney was in control of the tackle which made Crooks drop the ball. It could have gone horribly wrong and was basically a throw.

That surprises me, but fair play. I must admit I did applaud one of the catches though. Disappointed he didn't blow a fuse though

Like I said, it doesn't matter, but I'd like to see that one again.

There's been quite a few changes and the new coach needs to have a look at his options. The only place he can do that unfortunately is in matches. He also has to cover the loss of Tickle's goal kicking - for me Westy should be encouraged to do this whether he wants it or not as he plays big minutes like Tickle did.

I have no problem with Radford looking for his best combinations and particularly picking on form. Crooks hasn't played well since (and including) Wembley (when he was probably brought back too early). He's class with ball in hand but his defence is substandard and the best thing for him would be to take some time out and work on the aspects needed to improve it. Opposition teams are exploiting the weakness so a spell out of the firing line would constitute good coaching in my view.

2 years after pearson promised us an half back pairing that would finally guide us around the pitch,we have an hooker at 6 and horne,who though still a decent enough player,will never be a 7.