I bet it was him putting it about he would be playing for Worky on Sunday! The little.........Malt teaser!

So will Jarrod be going part time now then presumably?
To think it was only 3 years ago when he was playing out of his skin for us in SL. I'm not sure if it's down to bad career choices or if his heart just isn't in it anymore, but things haven't really worked out for him since then.
Hopefully he can find some form and self confidence playing regularly for Workington, they will have a great player on their books if he does.

Part time team for rest of season at least

Shaw, Uaisele, Henry, Purtell, Williams, Mullaney, Addy, Clough, O'Brien, Sidlow, Olbison, Ferguson, Pitts; Siejka, Blythe, Fleming, Crossley.

Lauaki, Mendeika.

I think Siejka will play.

Mendeika
Uaisele
Henry
Purtell
Williams
Mullaney
Siejka
Sidlow
AoB
Clough
Olbison
Pitts
Addy

Crossley
Lauaki (I would play Fleming, but don't think Jimmy will)
Ferguson
Shaw

I wasn't impressed with Mendeika last week, we looked better when Shaw came on.

We not only need Siejka to play but he needs to have a damn good game as he needs to show that he can pick up the slack caused by Gaskell's absence.

Give the man chance. He'll be coming backs from a long lay off, probably on a pitch that won't be great. I agree he definitely needs to start, but let's give him a couple of games to get going.

Agree with Paul, Mendieka didn't have best of games last week.

Not sure Medieka was any worse than anyone else last week?

Think that's fair comment.

Other than running around like a loony and putting obvious effort in, it's hard to stand out when the side as a whole is misfiring. This applies even more to a half who is depending on the forwards to give him a platform.

Here's the trouble, Siejka hasn't exactly set the world on fire since his arrival in UK rugby. So far, the only things you can say about his Bradford career is that a strong argument can be made for him being a major factor in losing to Leigh on the opening day (2 sin bins and several missed kicks). A lot of the fans are less than thrilled by him and if he doesn't start turning in some good performances a large section of the crowd is going to be on his back which won't help him get better. The pressure is definitely on him to perform, which he can do [youtubem15Ve8olPBE[/youtube

Lowes seemed to be satisfied with his contribution immediately before his injury. Perhaps he was playing the game he was required to do. We may not need him to kick goals but I would like to see an improvement in tactical kicking.
As for Mendeika I just don't get the criticism. He looks to have bags of potential and I'm confident he will become a good fit with the team. I'd be happy to see him at 6 or 1 and maybe interchanging those roles with Mullaney.

Tbh whilst we did improve after Shaw came on think it had as much to do with weather improving as the substitution. Cant remember Mendeika making any glaring errors last week.

He's been good in the games he played but last week he really struggled with te ball bobbling a long ground. Seemed to improve when Shaw came on.

With Siejka coming back, Mendieka is one to miss out for me.

I'd go:

Shaw
Uaisele
Henry
Purtell
Williams
Mullaney
Siejka
Clough
O'Brien
Sidlow
Pitts
Olbison
Addy

Ferguson
Crossley
Lauaki
Blythe

Fleming and Mendieka to miss out for me.

interesting team selection.

sjelka at standoff with addy at scrumhalf. shaw replaces uiasele on wing. mullane at fb. uiasele and fleming miss out.

was hoping we'd go sjelka mullaney in halves with sjelka in his correct position.

Listened on bcb and sounded like the props struggled again. Mullaney sounded threatening and 2 more points.

Wasn't at the game but did sound like we struggled at times. I'd freshen things up for our 3 games in 7 days, but I think Jimmyy will go with the same.

Also I think we need a bigger bench. Don't see point in having a full back on there. Especially when Blythe can play a number of positions.

Sounded like our fitness got us through again but this won't work come the super 8's. We need to start seeing better performances. At the moment we'recdoing just enough

Suspect having mendeika/shaw on bench is to give some cover for mullaney and sjielka who are returning from long term injuries. Once we're confident their 100% we can strengthen bench

Did attend the game today but didn't understand tactic of keeping Lauaki on the bench for first50 minutes when we struggled to match Towns threat of comeback. Halves struggled to gel again - really need a cover pair for when Gasky is not playing - don't think Addy is the answer despite whole hearted commitment. We still seem to be simmering in games rather being near the boil. Also thought ref had a poor game -allowed far too much lying on to let Town slow the game down.

It was one of those games this season where we didn't win by showing more class than the opposition, but full time vs part time told. But 2pts in the bag. Luauki had his best game for us, Clough & sidlow did ok, crossleyhad less impact than we've seen the last couple of games. AoB still consistently good, Pitts was my MoM. Siejka was steady, and casting my mind back to his last game, is continuing to improve, which is actually impressive after such a long layoff. The half back pairing didn't quite work, which was the main problem with that game. There are other combinations to try, but for the next few weeks we are going to have a Gaskell- shaped hole in the side. Lots of work to do in training in the meantime.

Ref - basically we should be used to it by now. Can't do 2 things at once. Decided to referee the ruck, and completely ignored the offside.

Very much a Jekyll and Hyde performance. Far too disjointed at times and lacking the required cohesiveness in the halves to direct us around the park. No point Sidlow and Clough doing the hard yards for everything to break down from the fourth tackle onwards.

Jay Pitts and Jake Mullaney the standouts. Great support from the Bulls faithful once again.

Was a better performance than last week, though that's not saying much. Jekyll and Hyde, yeah, that sums it up pretty well. Good in parts and whilst not always 'bad' it was far too laid back at other times. Fair enough, we don't need the intensity in many of these games but, to me, we should be trying to maintain it, for the times coming soon, when we certainly will.

Pittsy never stopped, A O'B too was generally in the thick of it, Danny Williams ran well too. Sidlow and Clough went in hard and Sidders took his scores well, After around nine weeks out Harry Siejka did as much as could be expected. Too many periods of lethargy though, still we knew we could run away with it in the end, didn't we - is that any excuse though?

I noticed before the game than all the players interviewed gave a mention to "the long run" to Workington and how "tiring" 4 hours on the coach was going to be. Seems they may have talked themselves into that performance.

As an edit, I'll also mention Purts who had none of the faults and played well, imo.

Its not as if the Bulls switching off during a game is a new phenomenon, I remember the Bulls Teams from when Jimmy and Robbie playing were just as guilty and more annoyingly lost a few games because of it! I don't think Nobby ever found a cure and I'm sure Jimmy wont, like he said it's up to the Players individually and as a Team to keep the Tempo going and not drop off thinking job done!

I watched his interview, though I think Jimmy realises that it's very hard for everyone to maintain full-speed full-intensity for 80 minutes when there's no need. It might be easier to do this if you don't have a stuttering, predictable, slow semi-functioning half-back pairing directing the traffic.

But you gotta love Jimmy's style - in the T&A the quote is:


To me, it's another reasonably comfortable win chalked up, and another week nearer Gaskell coming back. Players not seemingly wanting to stay in high gear for 80 minutes is one thing, (though maybe people are overlooking that the squad knows we have 3 games in 8 days coming up) but the most interesting point out of it for me is whether during those weeks Siejka will stake a claim for a starting spot. Don't think you can make any real judgments after his comeback game after a long lay-off but it's fair to say he was pretty unremarkable. Let's hope a game under his belt got some fitness into his legs and that he starts to show some of the promise Jimmy has clearly seen. God knows we need it right now.