Bet you had a little rave to that back in the day Chris...

Down the Batley Frontier - happy days

Oh god, the big F

Nightclub of the year!


1982

Read an interesting article where George Williams said Burgess is like one of the lads who the players respect a lot who is there to put an arm around the players and if the players say they are lagged after a hard/physical game he is quite happy to cancel training and let them recover.
The brains behind the moves and structure is down to the other coaches at the club.
Imagine if news got out that Rohan Smith had that philosophy there would be an uproar.
Not that I was a fan of Smith just trying to justify Burgess`s coaching methods seem a bit soft.

Like everything balance is important and how you 'execute' that is key. Work your nuts off in practice and front load their energy (as they say now) in games and you can allow that extra space to recharge. I bet burgess has a good balance with the graft he expects too and holds the players to account.

And how is holding to account and front loading energy working out for us in the run in this season folks?

I’d say more honestly than the vibes rugby BS we were playing before.

Trust his the squad is pretty awful, recruitment and retention has been shocking for years, and our choices in coaches have been really poor going back to anyone since BMD.

BA, with the right squad would win SL easily, problem is he has a very poor squad right now.

Was actually working pretty well for 20 mins until Lisone came up with first of several match turning errors right in front of their posts. Don't know if you are trying to suggest we'd have done better under Smith. My view us that we would have lost that game by 30 under Rohan.

at least. smith has ruined us. set us back massively with his stupid style of play

Jim let it go, you're suggesting that Arthur can come in and within a few weeks reverse the monumental mess Smith has left, you've not demonstrated much critical thinking there



It's heading very slowly in the right direction ie in the complete opposite direction to RS.

He’s cost us 2 years of more knot untying. GH has made some poor decision over the last 10 years, employing Smith is right up there with the worst of them.

yep

How do you account for Bentley, Lisone and others making stupid mistakes - which is what actually cost us the game today, like it has many times this season?

Is this your hated style of play still? That makes Bentley rush the line, take someone obviously high, give a penalty away we couldn't afford and cost us a body for a critical 10 minutes?

Sorry but it's just too easy an explanation. I've said all season that individual players aren't good enough and it's my hill to die on.

I'm suggesting that there's more to success than just changing a coach or holding people to account, contrary to the many coaching geniuses on here.

We can agree it's heading more in the right direction.

Let it go? Wee donkey - you boys have been banging on about RS for months, to the point where I'm seriously considering not posting on here. You're like a load of grumpy old parrots repeating each other and pooing over anyone who doesn't agree.

Our recruitment has been mostly terrible for about 10 years mate, I hate to break it to you again - at the risk of being called repetitive.

I think all on here agree , we have a lot of problems with the squad / recruitment.

Many including me think RS was also a problem. It’s not mutually exclusive.

Not sure I quite get the reference, but think we have too many wee donkeys in the pack

Squawk. I'm certainly sick as a parrot. It would be churlish to point out (but I am, so I will) that Bentley was a Smith retention, and Lisone a Smith signing. I'm not one for kicking the ex coach while he is down, but ultimately fitness and .mental strength are qualities a good coach should insist on in the former and look for in the latter. It's a right old mess. I just hope Arthur sticks around long enough to correct it.

Jim you seem like a nice guy, but you talk bobbins sometimes. I offered my thoughts on What burgess seems to be creating, you seemed to suggest Arthur hasn't improved us in the short time he's been here then also contradicted that post by saying we're moving in the right direction. I'm not posting anymore boo.hoo

We’ve got a poor squad that is full of bad habits in part down to how they have been coached for the last couple of years. The players need to be accountable for their own performances (where have I heard that recently), but the culture that BA is trying to change has been in place for years.

I don’t disagree with you about the recruitment, which is in part down to the players that coaches want and these that GH makes available and signs.

I'd say we're all in violent agreement - Smith was part of the problem in terms of on field performance, and the squad is the other problem. However, Smith was also responsible for most of our squad being here, so our cruddy squad is also mainly down to his choices.

At least we've changed one variable - the coach. Now we can see the other problems more clearly. A small pack with very little punch, no punch at all in the backs to compensate, too many error-filled headless chickens across the board and no sign of any on field leadership. There really aren't many players in the whole first 17 I'd care about losing individually. Handley, Oledzki. Maybe Croft although he gets given a free ride too often for such a major signing. Pretty much every other player in the squad could be individually upgraded.

I'm not suggesting we can or should replace everyone. A big off season under Arthur would undoubtedly help change some players for the better, but it really looks as though we're far more than one or two signings away from being a top side.

I think that`s spot on OWL and of the 3 mentioned above I would add McDonnell and possibly O`Connor.
The rest bottom 4 standard at best.
I`m giving Croft the benefit of doubt but at a cost of 200k plus I`m sure a very high salary he should be doing better.
He was a stand out for Salford who let`s face it didn`t have the best pack in the world certainly on paper.
A big decision looming for BA as staying here next year could seriously damage his credentials or if successful would be high on the list of NRL suitors and would most probably leave us yet again looking for a coach.
For me I would look to get Holbrook on a 3 year deal.

Agree with most of the above.

I think there’s a magic tipping point in a team where you have just the right amount of high quality players to win more games than you lose; that then feeds into virtuous circles of confidence and every other player looks better too.

Practically we can either load the side up with more cheap punts/ projects (NoooOoOoOOoOooooo!!!) or focus on high quality and work with the youth. I’m very much a Camp B guy. Or just camp.

I feel sorry for Croft.
When you look at his trys / assists / stats they are pretty good despite how little attacking position we get.
Ypu can see how much it means to him to win, like in the Burrow Game.