A testament to McDermott's selection policy.

A pity he wasn't subjected more to McDermott's alternative selection policy to that of being flogged to death and had instead been given more chance to get splinters in his ass for a whole match.

No doubt we'll see Delaney doing 80 minute stints, with extra training sessions during the week, and a reduction in his physio.

I love Mcdermott's counter intuitive style of coaching.

Except that's not what happened at all is it.

Although it's not a new line from you as i'm pretty sure you said the same thing towards the end of 2014 and was saying something very similar when we lost a couple mid season last year too...

Can i ask the people saying get rid of 5 or 6 contracted players how would you do it?

As per usual there's a lot of 'after the fact' claims on here. Even the more negative posters on here were tipping us for a higher league position in the 2016 prediction thread than they did for the 2015 prediction thread, where a few thought we might struggle to make the Top 8 let alone Top 4.........then skip forward to when we won the treble and they're saying anybody could've coached that team to a treble, funnily that didn't come across in their predictions of 6th and 7th for 2015.

nobody could predict the injuries though, and nobody could predict how so many key players could lose form so quickly

in fact you predicted leeds to finish top! indeed I went for second. the fact is that next season a lot of the team will be another year older, another year more susceptible to injury, another year slower. you can carry one or two but four/five? no chance

I don't go for more susceptible to injuries because they're a year older. People said it about JJB 12 months ago and he's played every game since Round 5 usually large minutes. People said it about McGuire in 2013/14 yet he only missed 2 games in 2015. Peacock was still able to go every week even after his bad knee injury of 2010/11. Gareth Ellis' 2015 season was cut short after snapping his Achilles' tendon and at the age of 35 people are talking about him being Man Of Steel.

Briscoe has been arguably our worst 'culprit' the last 2 years and he's a prime age. Delaney is 30 now but he's had constant injury issues since maybe 27 or so.

how many has McGuire missed this year though? last year has gone. Delaney, because of the way he plays and because he's been rushed back and played injured is, more or less, finished.
some players are injury prone from a young age but usually the older you get the more likely to pick up knocks and the longer to recover

i

Yes but how many games did JJB play last year to this? That's the point. You earlier said you can't predict injuries but yet you're now trying to predict injuries for 2017.

I,m not trying to predict anything. my point was, as I said, we will have more than a few players in the mid 30 area, all whom have suffered more than a few injuries in the last 18 months. while 1, maybe 2 will get away the odds are most will get more and more knocks. add to the fact that, in my opinion of course, most of them have been way off the pace this season. JJB has been good when hidden in the centre but in the second row he's been a turnstyle at times. burrow and McGuire, I can't remember more than 1 or 2 good games from them.
and these are key players in key positions. are you happy to continue with burrow and McGuire in the halves next year? i'm not

I think you are right and as others have said how can you offload 5 or 6 under contract if you wanted to?

With little due out of the academy in the short term, the collective lack of pace is a big concern but not sure how it gets fixed up unless a few decide to hang up boots and/or return to aus.

Even then it will be difficult to bring quality in.

I don't think most people would advocate for McGuire and Burrow in the halves as they need a foil like Sinfield at 13 or 9 to organise and take control of the game.
McGuire and Sutcliffe did work well last year and it is a real shame that they have played so little together this year (have they eve strung 80 mins together in the halves?), but because of McGuires injures I think they should strip down his responsibilities, sign an organising half to play along side him, and allow him to get back to what he does best.
As to not hinder Sutcliffes development I think we should name him at 1 and loan out Zak for another year and let him have a genuine crack at the NRL as throwing him in at the deep end hasn't really worked

The rest of the squad I am pretty happy with (if rotated properly), JJB won't start when everyone is fit anyway, I would just focus on keeping Segyaro and adding a back up hooker, possibly OBrian from he Bulls

Well said mate.

So apart from halfback, which "many other areas" are we short of because of age and body condition? 1-5? No. Front row? No. Back row? Delaney maybe but Ward's return negates that. Yes JJB is 35 but he has played about 25 games on the bounce and he's looked good.

Agreed, at this stage most signings for next year would be tied up if happening so there will be no sweeping changes as of yet. I personally am of the opinion the squad we have is more than good enough to compete for top four in 2017 if Segeyaro is still around and we don't suffer the injury crisis we did for the first few months of the year. Squad isn't getting any younger though and Delaney, JJB and McGuire are running on fumes and look in serious decline. Great players they have certainly been for us but you can only go to the well so many times. All three will take some replacing that's for sure.

Our greatest need in the last off season was to recruit a quality half back and it remains so today. This omission together with the incredible ongoing injury list and loss of form are the reasons for our miserable season. Had we had the benefit of a controlling half back who could kick even with the injuries we could have finished in the top half of the table and had we had just a few less injuries and a quality half back we could have been challenging the leaders as no other team this year has been convincing.

To call for wholesale changes is just not practical. To seek to get rid of the players who have performed this year when others around them were found wanting is odd to say the least. The most consistent and better performances have come from JJB, Burrow, Keinhorst followed by Galloway, Ferres and Garbutt. Since his return from serious injury it has to be said that JJB despite his age and a drop in pace still looks one of the fittest and most energetic players.

Moon was solid too when he played and Lilley showed promise. A cloud was lifted after the dire Hardaker departed which coincided with big improvements from Watkins, Sutcliffe and Hall and the team as a whole and Segeyaro has added a missing ingredient.

Garbutt has improved as the season went on but was quite poor and overweight at the start. Watkins has consistently put in the tackles but took most of the season to recover his attacking edge. Sutcliffe is another that has improved his form since moving to FB ( I had suggested he would be more suited to centre or FB) Ferres has been solid without ever being outstanding and has been IMO a disappointment as has Cuthbertson whose offloading ability has been snuffed out and he has looked very average as was Falloon. Difficult to comment on the rest because so many were out for long periods but Ablett and McGuire have also disappointed.

So we need to secure quality at halfback and hooker as the priority and not panic elsewhere.

He will he will get contract extensions until he gets there - like Leuluai

So how do you explain this season then - is that a blip? How does 3rd, 6th 1st 9th look - looks like a downward trend to me - but then only a moron can't see that a one off good season - especially 2015 with Peacock and Sinfield leaving isn't the norm and hasn't been the norm for years. Of course that far too taxing for that void between your ears.

How would you describe Leicester's PL campaign in 2015 a blip or the norm?

In the 3 seasons 2013 to 2015 we were only outside the top 4 for 4 rounds. After Round 2 in 2013 following a pre WCC loss to Cas and the final 3 weeks of 2014 because we rested players to get the CC win. We were 1st for several weeks that year and top 2 for over half the year. Our average weekly league position was around 2nd/3rd for those two years so hardly a blip to jump up into 1st in 2015.

Win 5 in a row.

Sack the coach.

Our fans are the worst.

Absolute bullsh#* it's our worst season in years & we failed to make the top 8 play offs in a 12 team SL with only 4 previous winners.
Continually making the same mistakes poor selections poor signings & an awful managing of injured players.
Sack the Coach? Absolutely & he can take his "staff" with him.

Hooker!
If we go into the season with only one recognised 9 again then we deserve everything we get.

They have to make a call, if they would be happy with Hallas playing 9 for possibly months on end, if not they need to sign a backup.

JJB looked good? way off the pace Friday

Did you really just compare the most successful team in SL history to Leicester City?

You're completely off your nut.



(oh and don't forget to reply to my other post on page 6 too, you seem to have missed it)