Another rant at Coffee Girl


At least you left Radford and Pearson alone, no mention of their incompetence. Just give up FFS.

I wouldnt hold my breath

It really is getting embarrassing how many people leave early, even when we're still in the fight. Don't see the point in going at all if you're rushing off to miss traffic.

Its nothing to do with physios or energy drinks. When you look at how Saints and Castleford play, the ball is moved through the backs at a fast pace so effectively the backs make a lot of metres without the forward involvement and therefore their forwards are usually a lot fresher, unlike our play which at most times involves just taking the ball up man by man with no ball movement.
This also means with more energy they can protect their last tackle kicker a lot more.I have never seen a half back given as much time to kick as Richardson and the same when Gayle plays which means a much more accurate effective kick.
Saints have it all.Confidence,pace,Power and brains.
We have endeavour and enthusiasm and a very long way to go to be up there with the top 4 on a consistent basis.

Not forgetting, of course, the large number of senior players who are injured.

He's referring to our style of play which ordinarily never changes rather than the quality of player.

5 drives and a kick tiring the forwards out. Slow ptb allowing the defence to restrict our movement and our normally static defensive line waiting for the opposition to come to us.
That has nothing to do with injuries but rather our structures.

Surely you can see what bonaire is getting at. Yes you have had injuries like most teams. Injuries are not necessarily instrumental in how a team plays.

it is when your number 1 half is sat in the stand!

with 7/8 players sat in the stand, 2/3 not fully fit, loads of young kids in, abdull first match back after broken leg, how the heck do you want us to play, if it was that easy great but it isn't, I expect us to play the game with plenty of effort and guts and play to the best of our ability, with everything thrown at us I think that's what we did, I really don't know what some expect, to be 5th with all the injuries we have had is pretty good imo,

Exactly hull2524, when you look objectively at any sport, to give your all, as a team pushing every sinew till you drop at the end, you can do no more, our team did this, and as another poster alluded to, I was obliged to applaud our boys at the end after the hooter had gone.

According to a post earlier in this thread you had: Shaul (Barba), Talanoa (Swift), Griffin (Morgan), Sneyd (Richardson), Bowden (Douglas), Manu (Peyroux) and Westerman (Wilkin) out. Saints equivalents are in brackets (some are debatable the Smith/ Richardson one in particular but it is easily replaced). Would give a team of:

Lomax
Makinson Costello Percival Grace
Fages Smith
Walmsley Roby Thompson
Taia Knowles
LMS

ASmith Ashworth Amor Lees

Though more likely we would see Bentley and Brown in there somewhere too (though I’ve not given any debuts in the team above). To me that looks like a team capable of playing the way we do now? Perhaps not as effectively, and the bench doesn’t pack as much of a punch (I think we would rapidly make sure we only have Thompson and Walmlsey on at the same time in emergencies), but the structures would be in place.

Structures at Saints (and Wigan, don’t know about elsewhere) are enforced throughout the age groups, so bringing in young players should never impact the way we play.

trouble is apart from barba most of our players out are better or more important to us imo, plus it looks like you maybe have a stronger squad, you play a different game to us, we have mostly played a power game rightly or wrongly with a team sprinkled with flair, its done us well the last two years but again for US these injuries have hit us hard, remember we hadn't done well for years then the last 2 have been good, get our full team or most of them on the pitch and we wont be far off, maybe to late this year but you never know,

Fair enough Mr Beetle, and then lose one of your starting front rowers and Percival in the first half. Perhaps not quite as good then?

But I don’t think things like a slow ptb (apart from when trying to win a penalty) and a static defensive line is part of your structure.

I think they’re more reflections of performance, which is to some extent down to injuries. For example, a less experienced or able player is probably less likely to win the collision, meaning no quick ptb in attack, or allowing the opposition one while your defensive is still retreating the 10.

More individual errors typically lead to more fatigue for the team as whole, as well.

But that’s my point? Whether it’s Barba, Lomax & Richardson or Makinson, Fages and Smith, or Costello, Lewis and Fairclough, Saints are able to play within their structure to the benefit of the team. This means that even though the first choice are better players, they’re not any more or less important to our chances than anyone else.

Hull are trying to replicate the early 2000’s Bradford sides and there’s nothing wrong with that, but if you have single players who that style depends on, then you have to look at how the squad is constructed.

After KC used to tell us how the full first team bar Smith would be fine despite losing to Leigh - Saints fans tolerance to that kind of dependency is pretty low.

…. if you'd had 7 players missing, plus 2 more by half time, I reckon we'd have won at a canter on Friday.

roby missed the game v wakey....and the winners were....wakey, so some players are vital to their team, if saibts lose roby going into the 8s they wouldnt be the same team they are now


imo

2 tries and 15 goals today for Doncaster. 3 tries for Litten.

Must play this week for me

=#FF0000Well you have now, enough with the name calling. Thank you

=#FF0000In the way you used it, yes!

I thought saints looked bang ordinary without barba last night. Had they fielded the same team against us last week I reckon we'd have won

Agree with you there Jake and also thought that St's got all the decisions particular in the messing about in the ruck/holding down and Wilkin should have seen at least a yellow for his trip on Tomkins which was a clear professional foul.

Although not at their best, I would not describe it as ordinary. They were better then Wigan in most facets of the game. One thing to note was the pace of the game which was rapid.


Wigan did themselves no favours with poor last plays and kicks

wigan aren't very good though. The defended OK but their attack was woeful.

I think they suffer from the same issues we have (not converting possession within the opposition 20 into points). They do however consistently move the ball downfield well (60-70 yards per set) as was evidenced against us recently.