After all if one of our 13 players had decided to tackle your man or ground the ball in front of your chasers you would have been nilled!!!!!

lets not forget two disallowed tries fro lyne and westerman!

for 37 minutes in the first half we was in complete control, we should have had the game wrapped up easily, no offence bulls fans, plus a gift of a try from lauaki only kept the bulls within touching distance

Don't be so dumb, if it wasn't for our individual mistakes, you would not have scored.

But they were not tries, so how can you have an issue with them?
If we hadn't dropped the ball, then we would have won comfortably...

It's all if and maybes, two poor sides, you were less poor and fully deserved your win. End of really.

We lost game the in the forwards IMO. That's why the ball was slow to come out of the PTB and slow to get to the halves and as a result slow to get to the backs.

Too often we didn't seem to have a gorward hitting the ball at pace, Lynch was the only one to do it consistently. When Koppy did it he made ground, Sibbit did it a few times but the rest seemed to be taking it stood still. In contrast the likes of O'Meley, Fitzgibbon, Manu and Westerman really took the ball up at pace and hey presto they got a quick PTB and got on top of us. It's not rocket science.

IMO Langley can't have been fully fit given his below par performance, he looked off the pace from his first touch where he knocked on. Scruton is well short of match fitness and Elima was well short of the form he showed the previous week.

In the backs it was obvious where the threat was coming from. Yeaman scored a hat load this season and Manu breaks tackles for fun. Was I the only one to wonder why Ah Van moved to fullback when Kearney went off and Royston stayed on the wing? Very odd. I think we can deduce that Ah Van is a winger and that's it really. IMO he should be let go at the end of the season.

Not sure what the preparation was like or who played with knocks this week but the side looked short of enthusiasm compared with Hull. Admittedly on paper they have a better side but we can play a lot better than we did yesterday and have shown it against better sides that Hull. Hull struck me as a side that could and should be better than they are and I can see why they're languishing in 8th.

As for us. I'm afraid it'll take a miracle for us to make the 8, we simply lack the quality.

Starting from the viewpoint of our bombed tries in the second half, if we had scored any one of those three then it would have been game on, with us 2 points behind and on a roll. I reckon we would have won, though not deserved to. Hull fans retorting about them missing chances are entirely missing the point. We are discussing it from our perspective and at that point in the game we were suddenly able to make inroads and create clear cut tries but dropped the ball on or over the line. Hull had bombed some chances too but that was how the game had reached that stage.

Up to that point, we were back to being our own worst enemies, unable to complete a set of 6. Giving Hull acres of territory and attack that needlessly tired us out. So normal, then.

We got caned by Bentham and the touchie for about an hour, during which several Hull high shots, offsides and holding down went unnoticed. This added to our fatigue. Whether the officials got it wrong or spot on in beside the point. The fact is we were penalised time and again and they never were, and when you get a spell like that, it is hard to do anything about it, simply because there is such an inequality of possession. Most games, penalties go, broadly speaking, tit for tat so in turn each team gets a leg-up or two.

With 15 minutes to go our lot looked like they were struggling to walk back, and when we had the ball, for a spell 11 or 12 out of 13 were literally stood still, sucking in air. I am sure the huge amount of possession we frittered away with perennial dropsy, and a chain of penalties, played a part in that, but it was still disappointing to see just how utterly knackered and static we looked when, despite everything, the game was still in the balance.

We did get a second and a third wind, but in general Hull made miles more yards in teh collision than us, and I would agree that one reason (apart from keen Hull defence) we spent a lot of time making little ground was down to slow and poor passing.

In between the dross, we did also do a lot of good and hard tackling, and we did create quite a few good attacking positions, and we did managed several good attacking plays. We scored some good tries and irritatingly should have scored more if not for dropping the ball on the line (again credit to Hull for putting pressure on attackers in those situations).

Overall, the game nicely summed up our season.
* too much inexcusable dropping the ball and giving up cheap possession
* giving away too many penalties (more possession lost)
* some good attacking play, but compared to most teams in our league, not enough.
* some good defensive spells, but compared to most teams in our league, not enough.
* an appearance at times of distinct lack of enthusiasm / lack of fitness / call it what you want but players walking or stood about in droves.

I have now seen enough of Herbert to say that at this stage of his career he is no top-6 halfback. Does some classy stuff but does not dominate anything, consistently is just a bit too slow, and consistently falls short. Maybe given time he will develop but overall as of now not enough in his locker - despite creating quite a lot against Hull.

I don't think Ah Van is good enough either. I like the fella, as he is a trier and never a shirker but he doesn't have the pace or the class and is caught out regularly. And it isn't his fault that he is the kicker, but he's not good enough at that either. His style is rubbish, and he just doesn't get enough of the pressure kicks.

Playoffs are gone now, so we can use the rest of the season to experiment. Nothing to be lost any more, but we need some changes for 2012 as our current squad has shown it can't rise to greater heights. I see the rest of the season as a perfect opportunity to let fringe players have a go and see what they can do.

tbh It looks to me that ah vans carrying an injury. his legs been pretty heavily strapped for 5 or 6 weeks now. Fact we're continuing to play him suggests that halley wont be retained. If raynors fit then think we have bite bullet and drop ah van this week. Give him a week off and a chance to get over whatever the injury is instead of aggravating it every week. Unless its something that needs surgery to fix properly. Whether he's retained at end of year would depend on if we could attract someone better and also situation with other wingers. at moment their all ooc at end of year and we need to retain at least a couple. Imo we nned at least 3 wingers on the books as a minimum to provide competition for places/injury cover. Dont think we'd be able to recruit 3 new wingers in one hit so some of ones weve already got will have to stay. Personally I'd keep ainscough and ah van and probably finnigan but look to bring in one new face as well.

I too remember thinking that if we had managed to score one of those we bombed in the 2nd half then we would've been in with an excellent chance of winning. We'd dragged Hull away from their gameplan and could have stolen an undeserved win.



Throughout the game we seemed to be prepared just to scoot from dummy half and we often went through 3 or 4 tackles with the backs doing that. Meanwhile the forwards trundled back without any urgency. Some were fresh on as replacements too so the fatigue excuse shouldn't apply. What was needed was forward to take the ball up at pace to get us back on the front foot, none was forthcoming so we ended up with a hurried kick under pressure because of no go forward. The lack of enthusiasm compared with last week was disappointing.



Yep they looked far more up for it than us.



We can get into good positions but we lack the quality to make it count.



I agree. He's got some of the tools but we need more quality at halfback.



His display yesterday showed he's no centre. That was obvious last week with the dodgy handling and rushing out of the line. Today in better conditions he didn't look any better and his goalkicking isn't anything to write home about. He seemed to let his head drop a bit so I'd swap him for Platt for the Leeds game and let Herbert do the goalkicking.



Probably agree. Maybe see what Crookes and Finegan can do. In the pack we don't have much scope for trying new options since we seem to have tried everyone alreadly. Think we need an injection of mongrel and leadership here as the pack looked 2nd best yesterday and you don't win much with a losing pack.

Langley for 2 weeks running has looked to be carrying an injury and Elima was conspicous as his standards have been so high lately.

And unless there really aren't other options, I don't think Ah Van is the player for us and should be released. FA says in his posts about his kicking, on top of that I would include the kicking out on the full which is happening too often IMO

think we'll know in next couple of weeks where ah vans future lies. his agent, Endacott, was supposedly up at odsal week before last so assume that was for contract talks. IF he has been resigned think club will wait a week or two to announce it.flip side of that could be that we havent agreed a deal and he knows he wont be here next year which could help explain his performances last couple of weeks.

Sykes could've easily put in as good a performance as Ah Van yesterday

Ah van has been poor at centre but has played reasonably well on the right wing always making ground on the kick return and scoring tries none of our other backs would have scored. On the grounds that Herbert, Walker, halley might be leaving I'd be keen to avoid the revolving door syndrome we've had recently where the players coming in are not alot better than what's just left. I hope ah van stays and goes back to where he played well, or at least better than the others. Is anyone else concerend at the regularity with which Potter is prepared to make wholesale changes to the backline every week?

Yes but one has to assume that it's due to injury or other reasons. I can't see him changing for changes sake.

I agree if Ah Van plays it should be on the wing only.

yes, both that and wholesale playing them out of position. eg Platt, whose starting position this week was the bench.

While Platt never inspires great confidence in his defence he's got to be a better option than Ah Van in the centres. Has he been carrying a knock or was he just dropped. If the latter then it's a hard one to fathom seeing as he just got a new deal and seemed to be playing alright.

Can't see him doing much at his age. He must be 60.

think connor mentioned he was carrying a knock in a tweet last week. maybe explains why he started on the bench, means at least his positions covered if he does pull up when he comes on.

I think some people might be being a touch harsh on Ah Van here, up until the Saints game many were saying how much of an improvement he had made throughout the season up to that point and would be happy for him to resign.

He dropped a few balls in the Saints game, but then so did everybody else. He still ran the ball in hard, made some good yards, and I can't recall any defensive lapses from him.
Yesterday he had a poor game, yes. But to single him out in an overall poor team performance is again a little harsh I feel.

Don't forget this is still his first season in England. A bit more time to settle and a full off season and he could improve vastly.

It's also been suggested that he's been carrying a bit of an injury for a couple of weeks

In which case, he needs a week off. He was so poor yesterday that it would probably be better to leave him out against Leeds, and bring back Raynor.

Is it just me or does anyone else think that Westerman was absolute gash for Hull yesterday ???

I only ask as on the Hull forum they seem to think he was one of there best players yesterday

I was impressed with Westerman yesterday. He had the defence in doubt whenever he got the ball.

As for Ah Van. I have no problem with him on the wing, he shouldn't be in the centres. He does have defensive issues there. He does tend to to come running out of the line on his own, he did it versus Hudders and got promptly stuck on the wing. Versus Saints he did it but escaped being punished more by luck than anything else.

Yesterday he looked all at sea versus Manu and Yeaman got run over for one try and made at least 3 bad decisions in defence.

think its pretty clear ah van isnt a . he looks a lot more comfortable at wing. given injury to walker and possibly platt carrying a knock suspect we're playing him their more through necessity than choice. That said I'd prefer us to either play royston there (assuming kearneys knock wasnt serious) or give crookes a go. Heck I'd even try sykes there, It is supposed to be his best position and if he cant get into 1st team in his natural position then its pretty pointless having him in 1st team squad and we should be looking to offload him.

See, this is the problem I'm having fathoming out Mick Potter's strategy here. It [iwasn't[/i necessary at all yesterday.

Pretty well everyone else apart from him thinks it would have made more sense yesterday to have Royston in the centre and Ah Van on the wing. But we ended up with both of them playing out of position. Even when Kearney went off, it was Ah Van, not Royston, that dropped into full back.

Even the pre-match announcer gave out Ah Van on the wing and Royston in the centres



Why not play people in their best positions?

Sums it up perfectly for me.

they weren't, neither were your tries that you knocked on, maybe a different ref or linesman might have missed both forward passes, (if involving leeds i'm sure they would've!)