all this if carney played or this or that matter for nothing. i think we havent played one game start to finish and say we were very good tonight. we are the top of the league how many had wrote us off at the start off the season lets get behind the team and maybe who knows what we can achieve lets just BELIEVE

Catalans never seem to start the season well. Last year they had the excuse of their players being involved in the world cup and not having a full off season. They don't have that excuse this season, and the pressure is very much on LF.

I said at the start of the year that Catalans were not contenders this season despite the great signing of Carney and having a good squad all round simply down to the coach not being good enough.Trent Robinson got the Catalans very close to OT the year he left and this squad is arguably better even without Carney, who they are unlucky to have injured it has to be said, but they still shouldn't be shipping 30 plus points a game.

Up until going off Aiton was far and away the best player on the park, although I felt we still missed him in the second half burrow was still very good.

Ward and singleton again were very good. Ablett I thought wasn't too bad but is still not at the level he's vern at the last few seasons. I'd say the same about hally too, he's still working hard every week but he's got more errors creeping into his game of late.
Achurch didn't impress but he's very much a player that will get better given more minutes. Delaney you can see is getting there in regards match sharpness, improved again tonight.

Performance was absolutely nothing to write home about, but you wonder how much that was hampered by the frankly bizarre decision to fly out this morning.

Had Catalans been a bit sharper, they would have come away with the result. Their own inability to hang onto the ball is what cost them in the long run, left them with way too much defending to do later in the game.

I can't see Fraysinnous lasting the season. That's 160 points conceded in their last four games, the sort of defensive form that saw London finish bottom last year.

indeed. I believe check in was 6-30 am so most will have been up since 5. like you say bizarre. going yesterday would have seemed much more sensible

We've done the same thing for the previous 2 years.

TBF the club do put a lot of thought in how best to organise the trip to Catalans, not just for the game in question but also considering the games played the week before and after......in this case we have a 6 day turnaround until the Easter period starts against Cas. We've arrived on the day before the game and on the day itself in the past so he club have an idea of how to approach it.



And had we been a bit sharper and hung onto the ball better earlier in the game then we would've won more comfortably.

Why bizarre ? Its only a two and half hour flight to Perpignan after all , it can take that long to get to St Helens on a friday afternoon on the M62 . If I heard correctly the team were there late morning , had time for lunch and some rest , then off to the game . Surely not that taxing ?

As others have said it can take as long to get to St Helens or Wigan as Perpignan and certainly as long as the coach trip down to London.

As I understand it the coaching staff and conditioners prefer the players to have as normal a routine as possible. With a relatively short flight I don't see it as an issue.

JJB on crutches and Aiton didn't come back on. Fingers crossed they are both not bad injuries. JJB is coverable but Aiton not so much.

Yes definately Aiton as a miss. Last week after the Wigan game, Handley is interviewed (on the Rhinos website) and in the background are players and family/friends having a meal and you can spot Robbie Ward on crutches wearing a protective boot so he possibly isn't an option to bring to the 17 which would be a shame as I was hoping to see more of him this year.

No I don't think it is just you. Unfortunately there are others too who cannot see beyond their prejudices. You think Burrow was poor

Apart from his assist for Singleton's try .....and apart from creating the space that led to McGuire's try...... and of course apart from setting up the Watkins try.

So apart from being the player who did the most to turn defeat into victory you maintain he was poor. I suppose in your opinion is was just another case of what have the Romans ever done for us?

Yet without them we wouldn't have scored enough points to win!

I'll give you the assist on the Watkins one.

The other two though? One was a pass from dummy half and is entirely down to Singleton's running angle and strength in contact. The McGuire try had as much to do with the interplay between Hall and Moon than anything Burrow did at the beginning of the move.

Arguably, if he isn't on the field and being hidden in defence then Cardace doesn't score because Hall isn't worried about him getting trampled by Pomeroy.

He did some good stuff while he was on. Unfortunately it seems some people's prejudices mean they see everything he does as being golden.

Note I was talking about the defence.

Aiton - dead leg, could've come back on if absolutely necessary but we started to pull away in those final 20 mins so not risked, so might be fine for next week.

JJB - hamstring, possibly a tear so looks like he'll be missing several weeks.

I would say that is spot on. He certainly made the difference, and offered us something nobody else was doing which we needed, but his performance individually wasn't anything to write home about. His ignoring of McGuire for a certain try in somehow believing he could take on Escare on the outside was particularly disappointing.

That's dissapointing. I am no big fan of JJB but think he is one of our better players early season, and certainly better than Ablett has been so far. We looked better with him on the field last night. With him out, and a man out of form, certainly is limiting the options for us.

Cas is a particular game you want a player like JJB.

hats off to your lads..2 great comebacks..one against hull earlier in the season and yesterday against catalan....if only our lot could do that..(thats what we should have done against hull kr)..well done!

Burrow poor?! Am I reading this right?!

We lost a lot when Burrow came on and Aiton went off. Aiton was tremendously solid in defence and an absolute menace at dummy half. Burrow finally got into the game in the last 10 minutes.
Achurch , Delaney and Burrow contributed to our defence falling off beginning of the second half. I thought we were the better side first half and handled Cats, who chucked the ball everywhere, pretty well.
I'm sure the plan would never have been to take Aiton off at that time against Cats big pack, in the circumstances you can't really blame Burrow who is brought on to do a particular job these days but you have to say we took some time to adjust. You just have to compare the way Aiton was dynamic and quick at dummy half to Burrow's static slow passing.

Also, what was it with ignoring Watkins for most of the match. He was up against a forward the entire game. The Sky team are not exactly razor sharp but even they knew that if Watkins was given some early ball he could cause havoc. Moon was very good though, probably my Leeds MOM.

Overall a good result against a desperate Cats side missing some quality. Boys showed character to turn Cats second half momentum around, especially losing JJB and Aiton who were so dynamic.
Cas will fancy it though, especially if Aiton is missing.

Is Burrow the new 'Kirke' then???
Reading some of these comments, you'd think we were at the bottom of the table and just been hammered by Wakefield.
I say very well done for an overall good TEAM performance.
Bring on the Tigers.

I know you were. But rugby is all about scoring more points that the opposition and IMO without Burrow yesterday this would not have happened. With regard to Sutcliffe I have been critical of him in the past and still have to be convinced that 6 is his best position, however he got better as the game went along and played his part in the victory with a self assisted try, 4 tackle busts, 2 clean breaks and 21 tackles with no misses! So like I said on this occasion we did need them both on the field at the same time contrary to your point.

I don't think either side would be happy with their error count or their 5th tackle options, or some of their defending, but the game was on a different planet entertainment wise to the bore-athon that Salford and Widnes presented us with on Thursday. There were some great offloading skills shown by both tems and McGuire's try was absolutely fabulous. Moon was immense the whole game.
However, if Aiton is missing along with JJB (which looks likely) and Ablett, Delaney and Achurch don't get up to speed, we are going to get beaten by Cas who will be bouncing at home against us. We can't cough up the ball as much and we can't give away as many stupid penalties. Kylie coming back would hardly add much energy either based on his showings so far. Going to be tight.