Disappointing. Salford were not all that and we made them look like world beaters. Too many errors and we gifted them the ball in our half too many times.
Yes they got two tries from dubious dubious calls but we still gave that game away.

Are cannonball tackles legal now? Shocking tactic that. Don't know why Bentham let them get away with it.

Poor tonight. And Leeds and Wigan up next. Bl00dy hell!

I disagree I thought we looked disorganised in attack. No dummy runners, no one seems to know their role. We just pass down the line (usually in accurately) slide towards touch when run back on inside.
Time and again gale took the ball at first receiver, we have 5 plays bunched next to him. Gale then randomly picked one of them.

Every single play, each player should know their role, either dummy runner, or you're receiving the ball. NO ONE should be stood still next to the half back.

Gale & Gaskell need to start organising, get players out of the line if their not going to be receiving it. They should know exactly what they are doing a tackle before they do it. When Gale got the ball it was like he was making it up as he wet a long and deciding there and then what to do.

Awful.

Wait for the cold light of day. Watch the highlights. You'll probably find 'all those calls' and 'all those passes' were not all forward and not all wrong. It's pretty tiring hearing that it's refs faults that lost games. If your team defends well, and attacks well then calls are irrespective. If your team plays average or rubbish then you see more in the calls than are there. If you win, you don't dwell on them. That's the reality. Constant whining at refs is getting tiring...

Salford were not particularly on fire tonight, and I doubt we've had an easier win at Odsal. That's not trying to rub it in, that's being honest. After all, I remember conceding 96 against you lot not that many years ago.

You might have missed the bit where I said we were crap!

Wasn't aimed at anyone in particular. Just seen plenty of Ref bashing on here and other sites. It gets a bit tiring that's all.

Good luck for the rest of the season.

Slightly embarrassed by some of the barracking of the ref tonight. All the line balls that happened in front of me were fine. There were some decisions I didn't understand but that's true of most games I'm fifty metres away from and don't have the befit of a replay for. Not that it stopped me from joining in, but still...

Can we all make a pact to give the next person who shouts "linesman" at the touch judge a bloody good shake by the lapels? It's only a small thing but there's not much that irritates me more than someone getting the frigging sport wrong whilst confidently telling one of its officials that they don't know what they're doing.

Anyway, I called it in the first ten minutes. Too many props, and nobody knew how to deal with having options. We didn't lack for them but the decision making was awful. The best thing Gale did was somehow contrive to fall backwards over himself whilst running forward.

Not disappointed exactly, I came away with the feeling that the issues can be ironed out quite quickly. Ferguson, Purtell and Kear were very good. Fakir's lacking fitness nut not far off it in spells.

Hard not to be disappointed with the result given the importance of this match. Salford are no mugs but I felt beforehand that we had a chance of a win if we played to our potential. Unfortunately too many silly mistakes once again gifted them field position. Tough few weeks ahead now and difficult to see where a win will come from between now and June. Sadly unless some of the 6 points are reinstated, I just don't see where we will catch up.

I agree that the constant ref blaming is getting tiresome, and distracts from what is actually the reality i.e we just aren't good enough at the moment to win games.

Yes, Bentham made a few dubious calls. But that wasn't the reason we lost. We lost because we gave away a string of soft tries and lack creativity on attack.

It's pretty depressing, because we've played all of the so-called 'winnable' games, and we're still on minus points. We've now got a run of games against teams that we're going to do exceptionally well to get anything from.

It's looking like we could hit the mid point of the season on -2, and that means relegation is staring us in the face frankly

Kear and purtell were good going forward with the ball in hand . I agree attack was a bit all over , that's gale and Gaskell not playing together much. Defence we were too slow and let them play too much and find the holes and the play. We still lack an enforcer to put the big hits in and a leader to sort the line out

Come on you bulls !

We gifted them 12 easy points tonight , the kick off that bounced out and the bomb we failed to clean up . Were on the back foot from then on really

Come on you bulls !

just a bit short of match fitness, but that will come. All in all a bad day at the office.

TBF I haven't heard anybody blame Bentham for the defeat. If they did, that would be nuts. Salford were clearly always going to win the game.

But I also agree that we don't look a million miles off, Fakir reaching fitness will be a big bonus as will a settled side for a spell. I always tip the Bulls to win on principle but to be honest the result and the game was closer than I had feared it would be, and we do have a clear lot of potential improvement in us.

Whether we can translate it into enough league points to avoid the bottom two, I fear not.

There are bits of what the team does on the field that looks good. But those bright spots are greatly obscured by the consistently poor choices made by the players on the field. Ironically, that's the only real consistency we've had this year.

Last night we gifted at least 4 tries off the back off poor decisions and we can't afford that level of profligacy if the club, it's owners, staff and players are serious about staying in SL.

Unless there's some serious kicking going on between now and Thursday, I really can't see anything but 6 humiliating losses from the next 6 games.

From the 50th minute salford's pack looked out of it but we weren't smart enough to get some of our stronger runners or backs one on one with them. (Other than the kear try) There were also times when hock and particularly chase lost their discipline. Gale and Gaskell should have had Fakir or Mullaly running straight at chase on the next play to rile him further, instead we went the opposite way. As a team we pick the wrong play far too often and don't capitalise on situations.

Even though he scored Adam Henry could do with a game or two in the stands. He may be the new Paul Sykes for flak but the lad made 27 tackles, and missed 7, making him our new front runner for falling off tackles. Matty Blythe, by comparison, made 30 and missed 0... a big fat zero. Yes, I think they were on different sides of the field and each had a brainfart offload which gifted possession but we've cover in the second row, albeit pretty average cover. Bridge in to second row, Blythe to centre, Henry to hoover.

Oh and Walker. I know he's one of Franny's faves but he's just plain outmuscled by everyone.

There is an alarming lack of leadership when Diskin is off the pitch. Part of this that our travails have left us with very few dominant characters who have been at the club long enough. As far as the pack is concerned Ferguson and Donno could develop into leaders but when Diskin is off there is almost no chat. The pack did OK but with a bit more no how we could have got on top of Salford.

Gaskell has played 3/4 games and is still only young and I'd like to see Kearney involved more. That leaves Gale.

Chev did play as a prop mainly. Which I thought was odd for a guy who was a centre 2yrs ago, especially when we had 4 props available.
From the 19man squad, I thought Kear or Henry would miss out. Chev would play 2nd row, Blythe would go into the backs. Either as a straight change with Henry, or as a centre/wing combination with Purts on the wing and Kear missing out.
Then you could have the standard 2 props, 1 hooker & 1 2nd row man (Olbison/Addy or Bridge) on the bench.

Oh well. We'll see what the weekend brings.

At least we've spread the 4 fixtures out over the 2 week Easter period as best we could - Friday/Thursday/Monday/Sunday.

I think the lack of game time Fakir has had would have affected where Chev played. Unless I missed him coming back on, he managed about 10 minutes before half time and a short stint after.

I agree with Hindle about Henry, one possible solution could be kear to full back, George when fit to right wing & take a chance with Kearney to right centre. That should sort Defence on that side & utilise Kearneys attack and good hands to put George into space.

Oh and the less said about walker the better, he shouldn't have been near the team Friday never mind starting prop.

From the comments i made friday night i wasnt blaming Bentham for anything to do with the loss, i was just stating the mere fact that he cant seem to see forward passes and as usual the touch judges were no help,

The thing that lost us the game was not respecting possession of the ball, especially in the second half, instead of being smart with it we tried to throw it around which cost us a few tries.

For me Diskin should not of been playing, clearly not fully fit and seemed to slow the game down, When o'brien came on we seemed to play better and alot faster, Gaskell wasnt too bad and although more than likely not fully fit they watched him like a hawk, everytime he looked like he could produce something he was quickly closed down.

If only we'd taken the same attitude to Chase, instead of standing back and letting him do whatever he wanted....

Indeed, was about to post the same. It's easy to boss a game if the opposition stand about and admire your skills.