I agree that our attack is stunted, but the Quins players aren't any better than ours, but the way the ball is moved from one side to the other is sooooo much better. That's training park stuff for me.

I think that backs up Mugwump's point. Quins are currently a team on an absolute high. Nobody expected them to do anything other than fight for the spoon, yet they're at the top, and beating Leeds and Saints away from home. Saints, on the other hand, started the year with high expectations which have been, to put it bluntly, crushed. One of the much-vaunted front row in Perry misses the first month. Pryce injured again. More than anything else, the Eastmond saga. Suddenly, the team which we thought was going to be dominating on the back of an international front row and an international half-back combination finally able to take control, finds itself without its front row and losing its half-backs. Add to that the fact that being homeless is hardly conducive to good times, and you've got a crashing lack of confidence.

Confident teams are far more likely to be expansive in attack than negative ones. You can always tell a team when it stops believing in itself : one-man rugby, trying to avoid risks, and not being in the right place to even make the moves work because you expect them not to, so there's no point bothering.

Saints are psychologically in a poor way. We do need an injection of confidence, and that's why it's so poor, I think, that Eastmond is likely to be with us all season. His presence is now probably counter-productive in every way, focusing on the past and what is being lost, rather than building on the future, and will get worse as the relations between him and a lot of the fans becomes a running sore. I think it could be a long hard season unless we manage to shift it around. Problem is, I don't really see Royce Simmons as the man who can do that.

I think overall - defence, attack, kicking game and team spirit - our quality has been pretty poor this season. Take out the Salford game, in which they were horrendously bad, and weve really struggled to score points. We lack organisation with the ball and look completely rudderless and lack leadership. We don't seem to have any planned moves, don't use dummy runners effectively and our halves don't take the line on enough. Maybe it's a confidence thing? Maybe they're being coached that way? Maybe (in the case of Eastmond) he simply doesn't want to do it? I'm not sure, but the halves are doing the basic things wrong at the moment. They're not drawing defenders and creating space for the runners and they're not taking a great deal of responsibility for our attack. The forwards also aren't offering enough at the moment. We don't seem to be running at the defence hard enough, they're not offloading the ball and they're not winning the collision which creates half breaks and 2nd phase play for others. Where is the support play? Overall, it's massively concerning how blunt we are in attack at the moment, kind of similar to how we were at the back end of 2009, but worse. We're far too one out and it's like the halves don't trust themselves and the forwards certainly don't trust the halves. Eastmond has to step up, he is the experienced half back of the two out there currently. So far his performances have been really poor. Gaskell has tried hard, but he is out of his depth at the moment.

Defensively we look really poor. Considering we had supposedly worked on this more than anything throughout the off season, I was expecting alot more. Maguire made Wigan play with incredible defensive determination last year. Their line speed was fast, they hit hard and they got numbers in the tackle. I don't see us winning the collision and it seems half hearted. There is no real attitude to want to donminate in defence, there's no back slapping for big hits, there's nothing, it just seems very half hearted at times. IMO, we defend too narrowly and get beaten too easily outwide. I could understand this approach if we were dominating in defence up the middle, but we're not.

I mentioned the team spirit because at the moment, we just look like a team that has no confidence and aren't playing for one another. On Friday, there didn't seem to be any real fight until periods of the 2nd half and the Wigan game apart, we haven't really showed that determined attitude and spirit which saved us a point that night. There was only James Graham rallying the troops, the rest were really quiet.

The players need to show more and the coach eneds to show more. Saints used to be renowend for their flair, their fighting spirt, but at the moment we're showing neither. If we're not winning that's fine, but I like to see the team fight and perform for themselves, their team mates and the fans. I didn't get that feeling against Warrington or against Quins. I'm intrigued to see if there's any difference against Leeds. I expect a more determined performance, win or lose.

That's because we don't have cunningham anymore and Pryce is out injured. There wasn't anyone else in our team who could lead. That was identified last season, and by people on here. Which leaders have the club recruited in the off season?


We do have planned moves. We had a beauty in the friendly against Hudds, which saw Wheeler sweep in an arc out of a scrum taking the Hudds defenders completely by surprise and he scored. A wonderful play. Have we seen that move since? No. We have only seen Wheeler once since!


Yup. Surely that is because there is no Leon Pryce there? He was positively masterful in our friendlies, untile he went off injured. We have seen him for five minutes since then. Meanwhile, we have Kyle Eastmond who for the first couple of weeks was getting back into the game after a long layoff and now cannot be bothered, and another halfback who has been thrown into the deep end without the benefit of an experienced and attentive halfback partner. On Friday we didn't even have Wilkin as a strike option or creative input. He's been very good at loose forward this season so far.


Again, no Cunningham. He was a massive influence on our go forward. Remember how he used to lift the team when he came on? Now we have Jammer on his own out there in effect, as a leader that is. And he's taken to playing at halfback recently again, which is unfortunate. LMS of course was absent on Friday. We might have made more impact with him on the pitch.


Watching the highlights from Catalans, it was great. But it didn't fire at all at Widnes.


We are poor, but no worse than last season so far as I can work out, but I haven't checked the stats. What Simmons wants is to go from shipping 20 points on average a game to 16, as he thinks that is the difference between a good team and a Grand Final winning team. I would agree with him. So far we have had two games I think where we have let only 16 points in. We could have included Salford in that had we not been lazy at the end. But what is the biggest score against us this season?


Oh dear. Here's that Maguire thing again. We don't have Maguire as our coach. Why are you comparing?


At Widnes we do, yes. But we didn't at Cardiff, we didn't at Salford and according to those who went there, we didn't at Perpignan either. We fought hard at Cardiff and Perpignan (we didn't need to at Salford) and held on well. Perhaps the problem is at Widnes, in front of the home fans?


We did in Cardiff and apparently we did in Perpignan. I think you need to stop panicking!

When Royce first arrived he said he wanted to reduce our points against which I can't see happening.

well we're averaging more against already!

Yes, we are. We wouldn't have been had we not allowed Salford to score, which is pretty much what we did in 2010 (they only scored 6 against us). Mind you, in the first match of last season we shipped 32 points, and so far our biggest shipment has been 27!

In 2011 our average for the first five games is 21.2 against
In 2010 our average for the first five games was 18.8 against
In 2009 our average for the first five games was 10.4 against

so you agree that potter did better that royce has

We actually went backwards under Potter!

averaged 17 under DA in 2008
so he actually improved us in his first season

But we were still playing like Anderson's team at the start of 2009.

She just will never get it!

they must have been playing better under MP clearly

Don't be silly, that was DA team and this years is Potters team



It will never be anyone else to blame other than Mick potter with her.

Not true. Clearly you did not read my posts last season. I blamed the players, too, sometimes. Although never Wello, who is one of my favourite Saints players.

You like wello?

If I told you that wello thought Mick potter was a very good coach, would you still like him?

I'd forgive him for his treachery.

The only comparison I can offer is that in your two losses this season you were not only beaten score wise but also well defeated on the park.
For the first time in 10 plus years we are a better team than Saints. In previous years if we had beaten you it would have been against the run of the season and we would have considered ourselves lucky but now we are a better team than Saints.

I now see our fixtures against Saints as games where we can and will pick points up, I have not viewed Saints games in that way since the mid 90's

What about Wellens and Roby? Both touted as future captains? In fact isn't Wellens joint captain?

I am a little surprised that people are shocked that Simmons hasn't brought a resolute defence with him. He came from a Tigers side that was all about attacking flair, defence a distant second.

I think the problem is that he hasn't (SO FAR) brought either.

Do captains automatically mean leaders? I was doubtful about Wello being a captain, if the two do equate, because I don't think he's a leader. He works very hard in organising the defence, always has, but organisational ability and leadership ability are not necessarily the same thing. Jammer does have leadership qualities but he is still undermined by his tendency to meltdown. And he is only on the pitch a limited time anyway. What I am thinking of is a natural leader, someone who can inspire from the front or calm things down or offer suggestions about how to fix something. Maybe I am out of touch or mistaking the qualities of a leader in a rugby league context, but that is what I am thinking of when I think of a leader. Someone who can take control. I don't see that on the pitch without Cunningham and Pryce.

Jammer was given the Englans captaincy. In fact, I belive he's captained many sides through his development (youth saints and england teams). He must have some of the right qualities, mustn't he?

He captained the England youth team once, yes. Other than standing in for about half a dozen injured players in the Four Nations, I don't know whether he has been captain aside from that? Anyway, I did say that Jammer does have leadership qualities, but that his tendency to blow up undermines that. Plus the fact that he isn't on the pitch all the time. Mind you, nor was Cunningham.

If they don't then they are a poor choice for captain. A captain is there to inspire his teammates, by whatever means.



Fair enough.




No, you are correct, they aren't.



I'm not sure Pryce is that much of a leader.