At the start of the season we were clueless in attack with Myler & Ratchford at halves
We switched Bridge to stand-off in Myler's abscnece and went on a long unbeaten run
Today first half we had Myler & Ratchford in the first half and were clueless in attack
Second half we moved Bridge to stand-off and Myler spent most of the time at acting half-back and were much improved

The problem is there somewhere, but it ain't Bridge and it ain't Ratchford.

While we're looking for scapegoats how about getting shut of Russell who gave the most stupid penalty away which set the tone for the opening sets and has absolutely zero game intelligence, Ratchford for kicking out on the full straight after and contributing nothing at half back, Simon Grix for dropping two balls that directly resulted in tries for Leeds and Chris Hill for knocking on 20 metres from the Leeds line when we had the momentum. Although that was all probably Myler's fault too.

Well if we played well in the second half and it was all bridge's doing, then surely the 10 game unbeaten run was all down to him to? Anybody want to answer the question as to where they think ratchford should play? He tried two positions today and was gash in both. I always thought we had bought him to replace hodgson, but the signing of russell put paid to that.

Ratchford to play hb with Bridge.
period

Bridge is a decent halfback, ratchford isn't.

Ratchford will be a loose forward ,he is not a full back as we saw earlier in the season ,but he should make a good job of loose forward in broken play running.

Putting the Myler, Ratchford & Bridge connundrum to one side for a moment, the Russell question is interesting.

Clearly he is young, and has stacks of potential and all the raw skills to be a great attacking FB. However, am I the only one to question when he last beat the first man on a kick return, when he last joined the line at pace, when he last popped up on the shoulder of Harrison/Waterhouse/Westwood to take an offload?

The obstruction penalty was unforgivable and in contrast, Haraker's kick return set the platform for Leeds 2nd half mini-revival.

You know Morrissey ,Richie Mathers is leaving Wakefield for London & we could have done much worse than bringing him back.

As for Russell's obstruction ,Leeds seemed to get away with plenty of crossing today.

I don't see Russell as a fb. his positional prowess is poor. I see him as a left winger coming in field to scoot from dummy half.

Agreed about Mathers.
I liked his last line of defence holding attackers up. He was handy in attack too. He had a big part to play in our cup win against leeds in 09.

Ratch to FB, Russell to the wing

HB...we need to buy, I'd be surprised if GOB doesn't throw a transfer request in soon, and then come back to murder us!

You're spot on. Loads of raw potential but so little impact up to now. I still think Ratchford is a better fullback at the moment especially in terms of understanding the game. Russell is frustrating but you can see that he could be fantastic.

His best two are full back and loose. More open and broken play for him to exploit in those two positions, that's where he's at his best.

He is best at hb now because we have nobody bit Bridge better.
Next year play him a fb because he is a stone and a half too light to be a forward.

Evans at full back pls

I like that for this season.
swap Evans and Russell. R&B in the halves.
Ormsby back in with Joel.
Myler dropped to bench and to be grateful.

Russell has bags of potential but he needs a lot of improvement in both his attacking positional sense and also his distribution which is very poor at the minute. I have no problem with his defence, anyone saying we should get matters back needs to watch games that he played for us that weren't the 2010 final where he actually tried. His last line of defence was a token stiff arm, he was at best a turnstile who never put his body on the line outside that final.

Russell will improve, his attributes are too good to ignore and hopefully he will work hard and improve over the next few years. I know we have issues at half back but seriously the major problems are in the pack where at the minute we have hill, a developing England and then wood and asotasi who are past their best (to put it kindly) and in all honesty of very little use to us right now. For me ben Evans, Harrison and 1 other to make up next years pack with hill and England. Grix is our best 13 we have been very unlucky that he has been injured so often this season. I personally believe we are lucky to have ratchford in our squad. Not at loose or fullback but as a running off the cuff half back there is nobody better in the league we need another half back with a kicking game to compliment him and we will be fine. I see no future for Myler unless he moves to impact hooker but if the daryl Clarke rumour is true then he is an 80 minute hooker and so impact hooker is really just a waste of a bench spot. Gob can cover for another year at least but I doubt he will be with us in the long run. We seriously lack direction all over the park absolutely crying out for a quality half back who has a kicking game and some organisation as well as a top quality prop. I think it was cat who mentioned before about a cheeky bid for dureau and this for me is a great shout so long as he can prove his fitness.

I have been defending Myler but indefensible today. After walking off at the end as far as I am concerned he can just keep on walking.

Hope he never plays for us again.

First half your forwards were missing. Is there any wonder that your HBs struggled? Hill and Westwood aside it wasn't a great first half from your pack and the Leeds pack murdered you. Hence the score line.

Thought Myler did well second half tbf. Worst game I've seen from Ratchford as an outsider. Doesn't help that he was being moved all over the place.

If we insist on keeping Myler we have to get someone in who can boss a game and he can support. I've said for some time he is a support player not a playmaker and for some reason TS hasn't noticed this after several years of trying. It happened every time Briers was injured or rested and is still happening now. I also fear we've wasted a promising talent in GOB with TS refusal to trust him yet trust in a player who has been proven not to be up to the task.
Ratch's best position for me has always been full back, he tore teams apart when given a go there resulting in an England call up in said position and he tore it up then too. For a brief period i thought we'd found our own Sam Tomkins during that period. An injury here and there and he get dragged somewhere else and we end up putting him as makeshift centre and pop someone else in at makeshift FB. Obviously we have Russell now and he's got bgs of potential but ousted someone who at this point would be reaching his peak had he been left there to develop.
I don't know what the answers are, all i know is this is not a team in transition, it's a team that has been in in a slow descent since 2011 and i lost faith in TS when he essentially said the mauling by Saints at the start of the year was a trial game.

As Albion says our forwards weren't driving the ball up and gave us little opportunities as a result. Contrast that to Leeds who were strolling up the park.

I was told on Friday night that until the last minute Smith had been unsure whether to drop Russell or Ormsby and spent the week trying different combinations. For me that sums up why we were poor. In a semi final at this time of year you should know who your preferred halves are!

This side is crying out for a decent organsing HB with a kicking game and an eye for a pass.

None of the ones we have can do any of these 3 key things well... whether is a new scrum half to play alongside bridge, or a stand off to play alongside Ratchford or Myler, im not sure... but without one we are going to struggle.

That role should have been top of the shopping list as soon as we found out about Briers... Nothing has changed.. INFACT, Smith has given them all ample opportunity to fill the void.

Myler was the problem yesterday? Jesus!

I know I didn't say that and I don't think he's the problem, the problem is a half back pairing of Ratchford and Myler doesn't work, has never worked and probably never will work.

Prior to the game I posted that Richie is class and must play. I still think he is class and we must play him. But our best half back pairing is deffo Ratch at 6 & Bridge at 7.

I'm not sure where that leaves Richie.