Atelea Vea suffered a shoulder injury at Hull KR and will have more tests this week to determine how best to manage the problem. It is likely he will be unavailable for several months.

Travis Burns will also be missing for some time too with several facial issues including a triple fracture of the cheekbone.

Jonny Lomax will undergo exploratory surgery to find out the extent of his knee problem and the prognosis is he will be out for nine months.

James Roby, Paul Wellens and Joe Greenwood are set to have late fitness tests this week to determine whether they can factor in the Good Friday clash.

Definitely missing Friday: Lomax, Percival, Burns, Walsh, Vea
Doubtful: Wellens, Roby, Greenwood

Christ.

Where's Stuart Howarth when you need him?

and that fat dirty sod got 1 match for causing a triple fracture. Real justice.

I think most people suspected Lomax was done for the year , the fact they are having to go poking around means it could still end up worse.

If the bottom 3 mentioned miss out we could be staring down the barrel of a slapping. Time for some more young lads to step up ? Hewitt and maybe some others to get a chance to impress maybe.

Lomax puts us on the back foot for next year straight away, he's missing the hard graft of pre-season so you could call it a year from today if not longer before he's available again, and then how will he be?

We definitely need some back cover, even more so if Wello and Lance leave.

Really unfortunate after such a good start, very difficult week coming up now and even more so if any of the last three fail their fitness tests.

Shocked at the triple fracture! thats a bad one. i was trying to be positive and was saying to myself it will just be badly bruised.

time to roll up the sleeves and dig in on Friday

Best case scenario is Roby, Wellens and Greenwood make it and we look like this:

Wellens
Makinson
Dawson
Turner
Swift
Hohaia
Wilkin
Amor
Roby
Walmsley
Flanagan
Greenwood
Thompson

Richards
Masoe
LMS
Jones

Worst case is those 3 miss out and something like this:

Makinson
Dawson
Jones
Turner
Swift
Flanagan
Wilkin
Amor
Hohaia
Walmsley
LMS
Savelio?!
Thompson

Masoe
Richards
Ashworth
Walker?!

are people in aggreement that this is KC's biggest test of coaching so far?

That does put Burns's performance into perspective.

+1

Yikes. But I'm kind of over it as well. How long has it been since we weren't in this position? It's getting incredibly boring now.

Makinson
Dawson Turner Ashworth Swift
Wilkin Flanagan
Amor Hohaia Walmsley
Jones LMS
Thompson

Masoe Richards Savelio Charnock

Worst case I guess ... Doesn't fill you with joy ...

(We'll need to cover the spine with Charnock, 1 match ban for a triple cheekbone break means open season for MM)

Losing Vea for the season is a massive blow. I wonder if the club can do anything with regards to the cap? Surely there should be a rule that allows you to remove players from the cap if they are unable to play?

Saints really need to kick off about Green's punishment though. A 1 game ban for that was ridiculous.

Vea is out for 10 weeks, he should be back just before the split.



Since Lomax is gone for the season, I can imagine there's enough of an argument under these grounds to have his salary removed from the cap for this year ...

I read the OP as seven months.

if that had been the case it might have just pushed me over the edge!

I know we tried to use the rule last year after Walsh was ruled out, hopefully we will again ... Only question is who might be available - God knows we need some good news!

HKR deregistered Dobson whilst he was injured in order to sign Willie Mason.

I was amazed nothing more was said at the time by the sky muppets. For me it was late, it was a deliberate shoulder charge and it was direct to the head, that's 3 offences in one. Add in the fact that it's a prop on a half back and that makes it a pretty cheap cowardly shot too.

I think we should face up to the probability that Lomax's career is over. Certainly at Saints, but possibly in RL. Terrible luck, but you can't play modern RL with two destroyed knees, especially if your game depended upon pace and agility.

The most rational thing for the club to do would be to agree Lomax's retirement - make sure he gets everything he should, as he's been very unlucky - and then use his salary to go shopping for a new fullback - urgently.

As for Walsh, I'm afraid I'm slipping into the sceptic camp - I'm losing faith he'll wear the V again.

You're losing faith in Walsh ... Even though the club said he'd be back the second week of April ... It's not even April yet?!?

Lomax is a very awkward situation. I want him to return and wouldn't want to lose him, but 2 injuries since his last contract, he can't command the same salary ... And we need to it to bring the cover in ...

Unless we're looking at someone like McDonnell in the lower leagues in Aus, I'm not sure who we could even go for ...

On Walsh, I think it's because his return has been a moveable feast. The club has given several dates for his return which have come and gone, with the date then being pushed further back. When something like that happens, it's easy to lose faith.

On Lomax, don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely gutted that he was starting to show genuine threat and talent consistently before his first knee injury. But notably he didn't show anything like that in the few games he had this year, and now he's had a second really serious injury, I just don't see how he comes back. Pro RL is not a forgiving game, and even proven great players like Sculthorpe, Farrell and O'Loughlin have shown that when injuries mean your body can't do it any more, it's not so much a gradual decline as a cliff-edge fall. I do remember when Sculthorpe developed his serious back problems, and there were people on here saying that he just needed rest, while the club put out a cloud of chaff about how he'd return "110% fit". But he was done. You can't play pro RL with a wrecked back. You can't play pro RL with two wrecked knees either. Hopefully the club have top notch insurance policies to ensure the player is looked after. But I think it's over.

It's tough on the player but he would be able to claim insurance I assume if he was forced to retire on medical grounds? Maybe the club could give him a non playing role and then let him go through the full re-hab without any pressure on him and see how he feels in 12 or 18 months. It's going to be a tough call for the club to make but by this being a salary capped sport there is no room for sentiment, at least not if you want to succeed.

There should certainly be a salary cap dispensation for injuries caused by foul play. We are now without Burns for a major chunk of the season, having to pay his wages and have no leeway to bring in a replacement - none of which is Burns or the clubs fault.

If the referees and judiciary are not going to protect players and their clubs from foul play, then there should be some financial "benefit" to being on the receiving end of incidents such as Fridays.

As an aside, a player who didn't have the ball sustained 3 fractured bones in his face, and the referee only deemed it to be a penalty?!?! James Childs certainly leads a charmed life at the RFL for whatever reason.

The irony is Scully did feel better with rest .... alot of it. His problem was his age though , he couldn't just take a couple of years to recover then come back. Lomax does have time on his side though. Although not rugby , take a look at the case of Craig Gordon the Celtic goalkeeper , he looked finished but after a long break has made a successful comeback.

Daniel Vidot from Brisbane isn't wanted there and has been told he can leave this season, so if we could fit him under the cap he'd do a good job allowing Makinson to play at full back. Stuart Mills is another, but he's also a winger. I've got no idea what other players are available to play in the spine though, so we'd have to look at reserve grade which I have no idea about.