There is only one person making himself look silly on this thread, and that's you. And once again you see fit to lecture that everyone else is wrong (including external commentators) and you are right. There are words for that. It says something that the only people you can claim to call upon to support your obsession are (inevitably partisan) Leeds posters.

And you continue to be totally dishonest. I see few people making "excuses", let alone "tame excuses". What I see are a lot of people applauding the effort, rueing the missed opportunities, cringing at the (few, but fatal) mistakes and expressing their views on the decisions. I, along with numerous others, have acknowledged Leeds were the better team and deserved the win. The "who has more players out" argument has got out of hand, mainly due to the Leeds trolling, but again people have expressed their views.

You come across as a bitter obsessive taking delight in any misfortunes that befall the club, and rarely if ever bestowing any praise for things that go right or for good performance.

I say again. You are no supporter. Supporters SUPPORT. You just forever criticise and belittle.

And the award for the most ironic post of the year goes to.......

(incidentally the most likely reason that more support for me comes from the Leeds fans in this instance is because they seem to actually have watched the game and have formed a fair opinion. Interesting to note, one of the most impartial on here, Cas loving tigertot seems to share more of my views than that of most other Bulls fans. I will take his opinion over that TBH.)

That's because I fancy you.

Yes, there was, one hundred percent definately. You can see it. You can see it by the fact Mcguire moved the ball downwards

Tut tut, shame on you. It's come to a pretty pass when [iyou[/i don't know the rule. "Downward pressure" does not apply to the ball carrier!! He has to PLACE THE BALL ON THE GROUND, no ifs, no buts, "place".

The Rule states:


The "downward pressure" bit only comes into play if a ball which is still in play (i.e. has not gone dead or been knocked on) IS ALREADY on the ground. Then, and only then, a player can score a try just by exerting downward pressure on the (already grounded) ball. (or (c))

Someone actually carrying the ball needs to ground it as in (a) - they have no other way of scoring.

I would agree that if a player drops the ball and it goes backwards, it remains in play, and after that either he, or another player, can do a (b) or a (c); however it is almost impossible to drop a ball and for it not to be a knock on, and the sort of situation where that might happen (e.g. a fullback dropping a big kick, but spilling the ball behind him) certainly didn't exist here.

If you're carrying and drop it, then you can't do (a). You can do (b), or (c) but having dropped it, it doesn't count if you've knocked on.

I'm moving on from this now. The ref cheated us end of we have other games to play with other refs to officiate.

Really? Let's read your next sentence and see how adult you're being.

Very grown up of you. The point was you were, as usual, being esoteric. You don't just discuss the Bulls on here in isolation do you? It's an easy and obvious point.

very grown up, again. Nice adult discussion. Why get so worked up when i express a different opinion?

because, rather than simply accept "your say" I'd like to look at some factual evidence. Now, of course, one can never say with any certainty that if players X had played we would certainly have won/lost (which makes the point Adey and Sadler were making about your absentees fairly redundant in itself) but what one can do is look at the last time you faced with your three missing players as a fairly decent indication that your statement that, in probability, you do not have enough to beat us with those three players because, just a month ago, you didn't. Not a difficult concept to grasp.

Of course you can but it's fairly valueless in the context of a game discussion without makiing the same considerations of your opponents.

balance?

The match reporter (usually a willing supporter who usually volunteers) has opined that the decisions were marginal. Marginal. Isn't that what I've been saying above? He goes on to say the home crowd didn't like the outcome of those marginal decisions. No s[ihi[/it.

What balance and objectivety does the post bring?

That's something I have picked up on. I like Adey as a poster and his views are always expressed articulately and well constructed. He is one of RL fans better posters.

But it does irk slightly that whenever I have a different viewpoint he does play that card.

I am not going to dignify that arrogant, conceited and insulting - as well as incredibly naïve - attack on the opinions of most Bradford posters' with any detailed reply. If you cannot see what a jerk statements like that make you look, then you really are a lost cause. With "supporters" like you, what club needs enemies?

Sadler is wrong. You were missing your scrum half, so were we.

You were missing your full back who plays the role of stand off from the back. So were we. Webb plays the same role. In fact, only a couple of weeks ago, he played scrum half in place of our injured scrum half.

You were missing a back rower. So were we.

However many times you repeat Sadler's view it still doesn't bear scrutiny

hard to argue otherwise.

Do we? Don't we obey the same salary cap regulations?

yes we were. As well as missing our best prop forward. That is without mentioning the in game disruptions we suffered.

Then Sadler is wrong, again. Your comments imply you don't usually like Sadlers views. Interesting you do on this occassion. Why might that be? The "package of reasons" we won were your failure to convert your chances, your failure to employ a better kicking game in the first half, us taking advantage of the elements in the second half and employing a good kicking game and our tenacious defence.

They can, but if they choose to ignore our absentees or your failure to take chances or your failure to take advantage of the elements in the first half or our ability to take advantage of those elements then they are, as I said earlier, simply looking for excuses.

A point somehow lost on many of the posters on here. It appears that life on Planet Eddie is not as strange as some may have you think.

Whether Leeds have a bigger squad or not, how anybody can appear to dismiss the loss of class like Webb, Peacock, Ali and Burrow is frankly baffling. Yes, they have a bigger squad but no squad in the planet can easily cope with the unavailability of such quality.

Well maybe if you opened both your eyes for once you would maybe see the whole picture.

As for you apparently now siding with Sadler, your number one journo enemy? Dear me, scraping the barrel again and it proves as has been suggested that you only seem to give any creedence to an opinion that matches your own.

Great debate!

In fairness ME is right here. A few OTT rants aside (including the latest one about winning silverware) most of his posts don't seem to say things that are much different to posters like tigertot and Bullseye who are not villified for their critical viewpoints. IIRC Bullseye (amongst others) was calling for McNamara to go after an early defeat by Saints this season yet this was seemingly ignored by the 'PT'.

Being a supporter doesn't mean that you shouldn't be allowed to make reasoned criticism of how the team is performing. It's not like ME is one of those posters trying to organise sit-in protests and make banners to oust the coach etc... He seems like the sort of fan who will follow the club through thick and thin.

But like us you will still blame the ref when you lose whoever it is

Nothing to do with different viewpoint. Unlike the likes of ME, you do not have a closed mind and live in some parallel universe where only you are right.

Everything to do with the way you sometimes express it, resorting to ridicule. Like you did this time. Something you and I have discussed in the past, in a discussion about "style". You are too articulate and knowledgeable to need to resort to that approach; so why do it? We expect that from the likes of ME but you do not need to resort to it.

My comments were aimed at your ridicule and derision, not at the underlying content.

And as for your latest post - you seem to be deliberately choosing to misunderstand the point I was making, and why on this occasion (unusually) I agreed with Sadler. We can argue till the cows come home which team's absentees were "more important". About whether us missing probably our two best tactical kickers (you surely were not, as Sheriffe learned to his cost) hurt us more. About whether Burrow and Webb are indeed your two main playmakers, as you seem to be saying. That is all pretty ancilllary, and as I said is a debate already blown out of all proportion.

What cannot be argued with is that Bulls are not spending the salary cap and Leeds (from statements issued) seemingly are. That is why you have more money to spend. And with that extra money comes the ability to finance a squad with more strength in depth and talent across including all positions than Bradford including - critically, as we saw on Sunday - the wings, the area where the club acknowledged publically they were light and having to take a risk. The result is key absences affect Bradford more than Leeds; that less money to spend means weaknesses in some key areas, as we saw on the wings and the inadequate tactical kicking game when the first choices are missing. And the net result is that, all things being equal, a "package of reasons" (I never said the only reasons) why you won is because we cannot afford the overall quality of squad that Leeds can and our areas of weakness relative to Leeds were quite effectively exposed on Sunday.

That was essentially the point Sadler was making, as I read it. And if you read the whole piece he emphasises how on paper everything should have been in your favour - for the reasons he said - yet in the end the game turned on individual mistakes and failure to capitalise on opportunities. As you rightly say and as few have disagreed with. And that point I was agreeing with. Who could not? In essence, you have more money so you can afford a better squad. No criticism of Leeds, just facts of life. What is wrong with any of that? Why was Sadler wrong?

I don't think anyone is dismissing the loss of the players you mention above, however it is clear to see that Leeds have a squad better equipped to deal with such losses.

Orford is the main playmaker at the Bulls and without him we will struggle in a similar way to Leeds when they're missing Sinfield. I think both sides have proved in the past they they are not one man teams but it does make a difference when you need a little bit of class to break open a tight game. I think most fans would also agree that Leeds halfback combo of Sinfield and McGuire is stronger than Sykes and L'Estrange.

The clubs obviously work on pretty different budgets and it showed at times on Sunday. Leeds took their chances and their big game players stood up when they needed to. Bradford bombed a few chances that they probably should have finished and we lacked a Kearney/Orford to produce something like McGuire did for Leeds.

I think we saw on Sunday that for the Bulls to have a chance of a trophy we really need our top 5 players out on the pitch.

As for you ME, I think the total lack of respect for your opinions by a fair few on here is your timing of your posts. You claim you now only post on games you've seen, did you mean to put 'on losses that you have seen'?

You are always a very reasonable poster on here, so I'll try and explain.

Few would take issue with his negative posts, if he balanced them with anything positive when the team won or they (or the club) otherwise did well. The way people like the respected Bullseye and Tigertot (who is of course a Cas supporter) do. Indeed, the way arch-sceptics like Bulls4champs2010 do. And people would take less issue if he at least acknowledged the financial realities of the situation.

But, apart from a short spell a few weeks ago, for the last two years he has done nothing but criticise and virtually never ever praise. And seem to dismiss and close his mind to underlying causes which are outside of the coach's immediate control. That is what sets him apart from pretty well every other poster on here.

If "following a club through thick and thin" means forever catching the club and team doing things wrong, and rarely if ever catching them doing things right, going to ground when we win but flying onto here when we lose to bayonet the wounded, then I've clearly been totally misunderstanding all these years what being a supporter meant.

"As usual" ... is ME your tactical adviser? Whatever. You make an utterly duff point, since I can either discuss a match, or a season, including any or all other teams or - of course you well know this because it is actually trite - I can discuss the Bulls in (if i want) splendid isolation.

Like I could say "England will be weakened in the World Cup if Rooney, Terry, Lampard and Ferdinand are injured". I wouldn't need to add any other teams into the pot. The discussion is capable of being had in glorious isolation.

Disinformation tactics again. Suffice to say I was not, nor am I, in the slightest "worked up", and can't see any reason to be either. I would say though while on this subject that your behaviour on the thread brings the words "pot" and "kettle" to mind. In your response to Adey a few pages back (in which he did not insult you), you used the following terms, to go with your arrogant earlier description of all but Adey on this thread as a "desert of idiocy" or some such:-






I made a short reply and back came:
plus sarcasm laid on with a large trowel. That's why you got a less than 100% polite response. What would you expect?



Jumbled, incomprehensible verbiage. The fact remains that:
1. I didn't and don't claim that we WILL beat Leeds every time if those 3 players are fit. You seem to be arguing that my belief we have enough to beat Leeds is wrong, but that's a different argument. Nevertheless, that can only be a matter of opinion anyway, not of fact, even though most reasonable observers could see how Bradford could quite easily have won Sunday's game had we not bombed so many chances, and that is without our key players. We didn't beat you - but to me clearly showed we had enough - on the day - to beat you. if you don't agree with that then I never denied your right to an opinion - but that's all it is - opinion.
2. In your haste to be clever-clever, your second sentence doesn't actually say anything, it's nonsense, because you appear to have missed a chunk out as well as got your negatives mixed up. I'm glad you don't draft stuff for me.



Well, great. You concede, after all that bull, that I can after all discuss this if I want. And it's only "fairly" valueless (in YOUR opinion). What is the matter with you? I [icould[/i if I wanted discuss how a 'full strength' Bulls would have fared against a 'full strength' Leeds. But the point you weirdly pretend to somehow miss is that I don't [ihave[/i to! That would be just one of a thousand different topics that people could, if they wanted, discuss. It is perfectly reasonable to suggest that our weakened team could easily still have won on Sunday (even if you disagree) and it is perfectly reasonable not to concentrate on or analyse or dissect the oppponents' squad when I am a Bulls fan talking about the match and the performance from a Bulls' perspective.

It is actually of great interest and relevance to me, as a Bulls fan, how our fringe players get on in a big test, and how we perform against another mid-table side, with our key positions weakened. So I discuss it. Whereas such a discussion in relation to the Leeds team is of no interest to me at all. Nobody was [iignoring[/i the fact that leeds had some players out too.

If you really want a topic headed "how would a 'full strength' Bulls fare against a 'full strength' Leeds" then go and fscking start one. Don't presume to tell me what I can and can't discuss. Or if you do, don't be surprised if I tell you where to get off, and if you're ignorant and rude, as you were, don't be surprised if you get similar back.

Yours in peace and love.
FA

Anyone fancy a pint?

Steady on, I have only made 6055 posts on here.

Guess who the ref is on Sunday..

That's certainly something I didn't know, not having read the rules. Having now read the relevant bit I am not totally clear. It comes down to the interpretation of 'place' - a literal definition would be a deliberate, careful arrangement. There is nothing in the glossary of terms which goes with the laws. I have seen numerous tries where the scorer just keeps his fingertips in connection with the ball, I wouldn't class that as 'placing' the ball, nor would I want to take away that skill from the game. I also can't find anything which mentions 'control' in the laws, though the laws quoted in Wiki refer to 'controlled downward pressure'.
There are 2 other interesting paragraphs in the laws which muddy things a bit further:
[iTry – How scored 3. A try is scored when:–
(a) a player first grounds the ball in his opponents’
in-goal, provided that he is not in touch or touch
in-goal or on or over the dead ball line.[/i
[iRelease after grounding A try should not be disallowed because the player who
correctly grounds the ball fails to retain it.[/i