Not to rain on your parade at all but I think that's incredibly optimistic. On paper and based on tonight I can't see you finishing higher than 10th at the absolute most.

Still welcome back and best of luck to you!

I think AJ,with his second row runs caught Cas out on the penalty count a few times.Hock did well,many did not.

It's called being selective..Good luck against Hull..

So, what would have been your verdict when we were leading Huddersdfield Giants 42-10 at half time (last season) ...Grand Final Winners ???
It was only the 1st game of the season...you patronising sod !

I predicted we will finish in the top 8 and stand by it. And of course,you like some others are going off tonight's game only. Just for the record,if we put in a sterling performance next week and win,it'll be a different tune.

Well said Atomic.

Haha not trying to be patronising!

Just think you need to be realistic and acknowledge that building up momentum in a league where arguably every other side has got a better squad is gonna be difficult. Also the other sides that you are competing for places with are more settled squads.

If I were a Leigh fan, Middle 8's and avoiding MPG would be a successful season to build on from next year.

I actually think Leigh,scrapped the score board second half and built for Leeds..Lets see how you go with Hull first and then come back to this..

Sorry...give my regards to Wildthing, I owe him a pint !!

I'll take that
Aything from the hardest start you could have got in the first 5 games especially as our records v Cas, Leeds, Wigan and Wire aint great will be a bonus imho.

At times looked like a team that had hardly played a game since last season.
Hard to judge individuals on 1 tough away game but there are lots of lessons to learn from sloppy play with some of the tackling particularly poor and also our go forward lacked cohesion.
That said finished on a front foot so take that and build on for what will be an incredibly tough game next week.
Off the field, great to see a solid vocal backing for the full 80.

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Hope you had a safe journey back guys and enjoyed the atmosphere at our place tonight, you did your club proud with the following you brought over. Don't be disheartened and keep your chins up. It was only the first game of a long season and you will get better as you get up to speed with the demands of Super League. I think one of the main things for some of your players left from the last couple of years needs to be developing a different mentality. Some are used to winning convincingly every week, but getting used to not being in that position will take a different mindset. Good luck for the rest of the season, look forward to seeing you at LSV later in the year.

Or Maria, need his offloading game!

Cheers Caslad.Looking forward to the return visit buddy.You have a class Cas team there,worthy of silverware..Good luck for the rest of the season.

Anyone that knows me knows I'm a glass half full guy (with a spare pint on the table next to it).
I'm not at all despondent. I didn't expect a win tonight, but I do think we will turn over Leeds next week. I believe in our team, I'm just not sure they can do top 8, year 1. I do firmly believe that we will not go down again though, even if we do end up in the middle 8's.

I know we will turn Leeds over next week.The fortress awaits.

Good luck rest of the season guys. You werent that bad, we just finished our chances when close to your line. First 20 and last 15 you were arguably the better team so it does show promise.

Definitely think the turning point was when we brought our bench on. 3 big guys in Millington, Moors and Cook and then Benny Roberts pace when you were getting tired.

Very good following from you guys - I had a walk around te grounf half an hour before kick off and you were singing your hearts out nice and early. Celebrating your late trys like you had won the game reminded me of our trips to Saints when we get hammered but dont care as we are having fun. Its all great to see.

Now lets hope you do Leeds at your place and show you arent just making up the numbers. Good luck and cant wait for our return trip to your place later in the year.

Reality check last night, reasonable performances from the pack with Hock outstanding. Backs couldn't cope with Castleford's line speed and were totally outplayed. Fortunately there are quite a few worse teams than Cas in the league so with a few changes we should be OK.

Two things stood out, we need maximum appearances from Higham and Hardaker would have solved our obvious fullback problem.

Gareth Hock had his best game in a Leigh jumper, and Danny Tickle gave his all, some good touches by Drinkwater and AJ had a gud un, not enough from the other guy's to mention in despatches.

Vea, would be better suited to Championship rugby he offers very little in attack or defence, and I am sure some others don't need reminding that they will have to step up their contribution, Mr Dukes has a squad, let's hope he experiments with it.

All that said, we can take some positives in that we did not roll over and die when we could easily have been on the end of an embarrassing scoreline, there are some different opinions on this thread has to how Cas will fair this season, for me, they will be the team to beat in all comps, they bombed a certain couple of tries, but the speed they throw the ball about and the lines they run are superb everyball carrier has options inside and out to pass to, and with Gale calling the shots the best playmaker. Cas will beat some teams with a higher score and a bigger margin than they beat Leigh.

Think Brown may be the answer to our fullback problem

VL, I agree with you, I'm not despondent,it's only one game but I take nowt for granted, Fridays game against Leeds at the LSV will be very hard , I hear plenty of Leythers saying how we are going to turn them over

really?Leeds are still a good, a Leyth pundit even predicted McDermott will be the first SL Coach to lose his job

.For e we should get this Top 8 thing out of our heads,you earn a top 8 place,some Clubs have been trying for years to get there and not achieved it,let's stop believing our own Hype,we CAN beat Leeds on Friday but we must do much better than last night.Our team just needs a bit of tinkering with the line up, not much,I'm not predicting a Leigh win on Friday, I'm just hopeful.

One word, discipline ! It was shocking.

Ridyards defence was again wanting and their offloads killed us.

Still, the pack did well and once up to speed, we will perform.

Just cut out the niggle Leigh !

I thought AJ was caught out a couple of times last night. He kept jumping off the wing to help Crookes when Crooks clearly had Shenton covered. He let his winger have a walk in for a couple of tries. Crooks was clearly not happy with him. Last season in the championship he had a habit of doing it and it paid off for him but at this level he has to trust his centre to do his job in defence. Which Crooks is clearly capable of doing without AJ's help. Leeds will target that next week.

Our kicking game was poor early on which meant we turned over too much ball which led to a nightmare twenty minutes in the first half. We need to be able to prevent those situations developing. I'm surprised nobody has suggested we were hard done to in the second half: two of Cas's tries should have been disallowed and we could easily have had another. Would have given us a bit more respectability. I thought a number of individuals did well but can't help thinking we could have done with a couple more trial games. Forty minutes pre-season against super League opposition is surely not enough.