Truly shocking display, terrible handling, no line speed on defence, compete lack of co-ordination when in the opposition 20, passes going on the floor or going to invisible players, lack of urgency and interest at times. Credit to Dewsbury they played the system. How many times did players go down "injured" when bulls were in an attacking position or on a repeat set drop out? Don't get me started on the ref. Complete failure to police the offside at ptb, pedantic attitude stopping game to re-feed the scrum, calling back players if the penalty was not taken from exactly on the mark (I know it's the rules but come on!) consequently slowing the game down when teams try to get a roll on. Two team warnings and not a player in the bin until the last minute. Dewsbury must have been laughing their c*cks off!!! PLEASE GET A SCRUM HALF BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE (IT MAY BE TOO LATE ALREADY).

Well two positives from that:-
1. Chance of silverware in the playoffs.
2. Not having 60+ put past us by the current worst team in SL.

That was the sort of performance that showed the scale of the task in front of Smith.

Positives - Clark, O'Brien when he came on. Lauaki looked improved too.

Negatives - everything else.

Smith's post match comments were interesting. He said he was quite happy with the defence but that the attack was poor. Too right it was. We didn't make line break until late in the 2nd half. Halves were poor. Addy had a nightmare. We lacked any cohesion or composure.

Lots to work on.

Listened to game on radio Leeds. To be honest I thought that the ref was ok ish with the commentators summary, Bulls at times seemed clueless. Why go for goal when you had momentum on their line 8 pts behind. Then stole the draw with seconds left only to give a silly penalty in stoppage time. Time for players to take a long look at themselves i'm afraid. Very poor

The ref was poor, but far from the reason for the loss. There were many strange decisions from the side. Three penalties on the bounce, two points behind. Run it. Run it. Kick it. Give one away. All of them involved looking at the bench with arms in the air asking what to do.

Hmm... where to start?

Credit to Dewsbury. A simple and coherent game plan, well executed and worked to perfection. It would have been a travesty if we'd stolen a point from them.

As for us...

1. Inability to master the basics of crisp and effective passing across the attacking line

2. No credible last tackle options

3. No line breaks or even half breaks for virtually the whole game

4. Periodic brain farts or passes to fresh air

5. Looked like a completely disinterested attitude from more than a few of them

Don't blame the ref. Fair enough, he dragged the whole game down to a scrappy, penalty-fest, but he wasn't dropping the ball, passing to the invisible man or lumping hopeless kicks forward.

To be honest, I think your comment makes the point more succinctly

First half - as bad as we get, on the rare occasions we had the ball. Clueless, zero organisation, but that is no surprise unless either Addy or Thomas plays above themselves in the halves. They didn't.

But that, you could say, wasn't exactly unexpected. Where you do struggle to understand is when 17 SL wannabees pass and, attempt to catch like a team of zombies might. Maybe we did manage a set of 6 at some point, who knows, but how can all the players spend a full 40 like that? Inexplicable.

Then, the second half. Despite having worn Dewsbury down, and them being knackered, in truth we never once looked remotely like scoring. They defended resolutely but the fatigue was obvious, yet we were so easy to defend against. How can we, even with no halfbacks, be so rankle crap and devoid of any speed, guile or threat in attack? Our attempts to mount raids were often embarrassing. What do these guys do all week? If made to watch that tomorrow, what will they all honestly think?

The ref was what he was, and his team warning every 10 mins was maybe the highlight, but credit to the knackered Dewsbury troops, they spent at least 10 minutes causing endless stoppages so they could both suck air in, get a drink, and disrupt our attack, and it is not their fault that the ref fell for it. Like a WWF ref, it was as if he was oblivious to the tactics.

The brutal truth is that Dewsbury looked the better of two uninspiring teams, and a draw would have been lucky for us and undeserved. But how pathetic that against a tired and wilting opponent, at home, in the ascendancy, and with the momentum, we instead went for the 2. contrast this with Dewsbury in the 95th minute - they were in no mood to settle for a draw and kudos to them for that. And idiotically conceding a late penalty for the second week on the trot, is so monumentally pathetic that frankly, I really don't know what to say.

A desperate afternoon, with no redeeming features.

That was the worst performance I've seen from us ever since we were relegated. In that first half they looked like a bunch of players who had never even trained together before. Addy at hooker doesn't work, and Mathers/Thomas in the halves was also a disaster. The distribution was at a snail's pace and the Dewsbury defence were on the receivers before they even had the ball because of how slow it was.
No attacking structure whatsoever, no opportunity for Clare to push up as the extra man, no early ball to the centres. The only time our wingers touched the ball was when they collected from dummy half for a scoot.

It was just so bad I'm still in slight disbelief at what I was watching. I cynically thought, after the Leigh game, that some of our guys were trying extra hard simply because of the occasion - against Leigh on Sky with all those SL scouts keeping a keen eye on potential signings. They were playing for contracts elsewhere.
Having seen the dross those same players served up today, I'm now convinced that was the case.

Even Marc Green in his programme notes today was speaking about the upcoming middle 8s. So even the chairman is complacent. God knows what happens if we finish outside the top 4 - the central funding will be peanuts by comparison, season ticket sales will no doubt drop off, and Green doesn't have the financial clout to cover it. In other words, we will be completely and utterly screwed.

I bet Rohan Smith is wondering what he's taken on. We're crap and we know we are but more importantly so do the other teams. They know that they have a chance against a limp wristed set of farts.

And for the sake of Jesus H Christ, can we please scour the earth, outer space or the lower reaches of the Pennine League for someone who can play at scrum half.

Bring back Lowes

Do you think Leigh will lend us one of their six scrum halves?

Ferres has probably not even noticed....

I didn't know his middle name began with H ,what is the H for?

Hedley.

Hominum

We very often are crap, to varying degrees, but I really wouldn't mind so much if I didn't know that the players are all capable of playing like they did against Leigh. That's what I find as hard to take as anything.

It's not H it's F.

Me too, speaking as a Leyther!

Why do you have to raise your game whenever you play us?

Although it wasn't great, I think you're forgetting how utterly terrible we were against Sheffield a couple of months back. To give us a bit of credit I thought the defence held up well for the most part considering how much pressure we were under in the first half. It was just our attack was particularly blunt in the first 40, and not much better in the second.

In an era where a full back is essentially a 3rd half back, you lot are effectively playing with 1. James Clare should be the best winger in the competition, he's fast, tall, gangly, his best features suit the wing , not a creative role of full back. Mathers is a full back, not a half, thus a lot of pressure on the young lad, who will be a good player but ain't gonna get you out of the slight rut you are in.

Frustrating. Angry and we have one hell of a battle on our hands now. Still think we'll make 4th. Just! Our completion was a complete disgrace in that first half. Forget having no HBs. We could have had Wally Lewis and Andrew John's in that first half and it wouldnt have made a difference if you drop it on the 1st and 2nd tackle.

Addys missed kick though. It was easy and at 14 -14 we can start thinking about drop goal. Simple kick missed AGAIN! Then we're chasing a try in the last 15 mins.
Yes we played dire but still doesn't excuse that kick which would have given us a chance of nicking something from the game. Kicking duties need to change.

Olbison Haggerty and Pitts all had shockers. I think a rest for all 3 is needed. Lumb and O'Brien need to be the interchange hookers. Addys distribution is just too slow.

Thought bringing Thomas off was a mistake. He looked more threatening than Mathers.

Massive week coming up with Workington Oldham and Batley. Batley could kill our season and we have a lovely timed mid-week fixture just before. lovely!

Is it possible that with the euphoria of Smith arriving and a decent loss last week we were starting to get too giddy about our prospects.
At a time when Smith will be making a list for targets and assessing current players this might be the best thing for us as long as it is one game. Last week possibly papered over the cracks. Today pulled that paper off and showed the full truth of what is really under it. We keep telling ourselves we have good SL quality players but they perform exactly like poor championship players. Something has to change. Either the players up their game or we actually let many of them go and bring in fresh faces and start again in November. Many of us said that the biggest danger for us in staying in the championship for too long as we will come down to their level and end up being an average championship team. Well, it has happened. We now see playing a mid table team as a big game. Our standards are now on the floor. We are still dreaming SL but actually living mid table Championship.
We can't afford to miss out on the top four in financial terms. I am getting pi$$ed of with one decent game followed by a week of nice comments in the paper and then this to bring us all down to earth.
How does a professional RL team expect to play for a season and half without a scrum half? Ferress and Lowes have a lot to answer for.
I hope Smith gives it another few weeks and then walks into Ferress's office with a list of demands that must be achieved for next season. Losing isn't a problem in sport but what we saw today is embarrassing.

There it was Rohan,all you needed to know.Hope your contacts come good,because otherwise you're looking for miracles.

Didn't think it could gt this bad, especially after last week. Can't be bothered looking back to who said Addy was crap but he probably made the best two clean breaks of the game. Was anybody backing up, no, and this is where we miss a good full back, for all Clares good work he's no Mullaney/Withers, perhaps Moss might be the answer, hope so. as everyone alludes, Rohan your job starts now!!

Smith has clearly lost the dressing room. Lets hope the players follow suit.