On that basis how did Kirke get selected after the cas game?

What i have seen of the lad he is just not good enough, but I hope I am wrong. It is clear his confidence is shot. You have to worry for him as the fans are on his back, fans clap out of relief when he catches a simple ball. I feel he needs a few weeks at Hunslett to get his confidence back.

i know he is from exeter but he left for oz at a very young age so if you want to be a pedantic nit picker i suppose he is english.
but he certainly is not british trained and i still wouldn't have touched him in front of home grown players

Don't think it half abletts fault at all. Ablett is a good centre but usually plays on the opposite side. We rarely attack on the right hand side anyway

Vickery was not much better this week than last. Luckily Wigan didn't have a Danny Brough to exploit him, though he did still concede his 3rd 40/20 down his flank.

You cant really criticise Vickery for the 40-20 it came on the second or third tackle. If he dropped back on tackle three and a break came down that wing he have been crucified with good reason.

He does look to be lacking confidence and he is certainly being targeted by the opposition. He seemed to be knocked back 5-10 meters each time he was tackled although BJB can suffer from this.

You think it's a coincidence we're conceding so many 40/20s and they're all down his flank?

It's the lack of ability to recover when breaks (inevitably) come down his wing that most bothers me. It happened at Saints, and again this week he was burned off and was jogging (sprinting?) back nowhere near the play for the next tackle after Watkins had superbly dealt with a Farrell break and fortunately we got a knock-on decision.

I would say that this is more worrying because you can teach positioning but you can't teach pace, although in this case it looks like you can't teach positioning either.

I'd say that as he's on the right that is where a right footed kicker (ie. most of them) would probably find it easier to kick a 40/20?

All in all it remains a mystery what McDermott sees in him? You have to blame the coach rather than the player for him being selected in a position (any position?) he is obviously ill equipped for.

Makes sense, but Brough is left-footed.

For the 40-20 on Friday, you have to ask why Watkins was defending ten metres behind the line when Wigan were in their own half? Had he been a further 20-30 metres back, i.e. where he should have been, he might have had half a chance of getting back to cut it off.

But no, anything that happens on the right hand side of the pitch must be Vickery's fault.

Welcome to Leeds Joe, enjoy being the scapegoat.

I guess people are more forgiving of Watkins because he does have talent that does warrant selection.....but, I have also said elsewhere, you have to again question McDermott's selections: here somebody with very limited experience in the FB position compounding his selection of Vickery on the wing.

Wasn't it early in the tackle count when kicked when both wingers and full back are not dropping back. FWIW I agree and don't tend to blame him for that 40/20. That said I haven't been impressed at all with his performances, and from what I have seen I cannot see what he offers to the team. Appears to be a passenger at this time

I wonder if the players ever come on here and read these comments?Roy Dickinson once went to an away game with some of the lads from our local in the 80s.All lifelong fans steeped in the game.Roy told me "all good lads but at times they don't know what they are on about"

As opposed to Roy being the epitome of an intelligent fountain of knowledge

Well yes,but I found it interesting what someone like him thinks of comments from fans.Although don't underestimate Roy:

Did not mean to......just making the point that sometimes those that are 'qualified' do not actually always know best.

It's like we re-signed Richie Mathers.

I heard that there is proof that Vickery supplied Shergar burgers to Tesco and that Lord Lucan is buried in his back garden. It's also a little known fact that he mixed the cement for the Deepwater Horizon well head.
I also blame him for a series of overly loose stools I passed last week (it had to be him, it ccouldn't have been anything to do with my visit to India).

Don't be childish Andy. I defended Vickery after the breaks down his side in the Saints game, because I didn't think they were his primary fault. However, these last two games he has been woeful and looks lost. I believe he is being targeted by astute opposition players and coaches who recognize this.

If you disagree, fair enough, you're usually bright enough to articulate it, but simply dismissing these observations as scape-goating doesn't cut the mustard.

Precisely and probably the only reason Vickery's non-performance has been spared a critiquing thus far.

Pros: Apart from one ball caught behind the line in the second half under little pressure Wigan didn't appear to target him with kicks. Odd choice that one.

Cons: Spilled a pass early - was he trusted to receive any after that? In his first two carries he got driven back and dominated in the tackle - at least this week he didn't spill it in these situations. After the Jones-Buchanan try on the kick restart Vickery ran towards the ball as if to take it on the full then inexplicably stopped, looked over at Watkins and allowed the ball to bounce. The non-tackle that allowed the long break out (and as noted earlier) the lame chase back in readiness for the next tackle.

Nothing else really springs to mind as I said above it was a bit of a quiet game for him although why Wigan didn't target him remains a mystery as they were never going to get much change out of the excellent Hall on the other flank

Tad, if you touched him in front of home grown players, you'd be on some sort of register by now !

The thing with Vickery is that, to be fair, he is only playing at the moment because we have injuries to two of our first choice "back 3" players.

He also looked like a player more short on confidence than anything else. It isn't as if he doesn't know how to catch a rugby ball is it? Somebody needs to sit him down and get his head right. He isn't going to be first choice, but I think he's a better player than he's shown in the last 2 games.

8 tackles and 3 misses this week, which does slightly improve his season's ratio which now reads 18 tackles and 8 misses, to go alongside the 34 carries with 6 errors.

Let's not look for excuses. He is playing because we have injuries to one of first choice back five.

With the messages coming out preseason, there is no guarantee that he wouldn't have started the first game ahead of BJB anyway.