Again, I find myself sticking up for McDermott. Luke Dorn will play stupid rugby league no matter who the coach is. So will Chad Randall.

Lister is your middle name contrary?

If I had to choose between Randall and McDermott it wouldn't be a hard choice.

The trouble with Quins is that they cannot complete consistent sets of six and seem to panic leading to basic errors which the opposition often exploit and score. I have watched the current squad train on a number of occasions and many of the mistakes made during a game are present in training. Mac is passionate about the game and try has he might to develop the team the problem is with the quality of the players and there is little he can do once they are on the pitch during a game. We are simply not a competitive SL team who over the season have been found out and our league position tells the story.
This season is over and I believe we are seeing the death of the current set up, Mac will end up at Bradford and a number of the squad will move on or retire.

It's hard to argue with most of this, but on the general point I agree with Mac that I'd rather see them losing trying to play rugby than the tedious losing arm wrestles we got at the end of last season and the beginning of this.

His sub-text is that we don't have the personnel to compete in every facet of the game so we either play a high-risk game (frustrating when the ball doesn't stick or the players are unable to follow through) or play Nobby-one-up-and-a-kick. I prefer the first.

The worry, as PTB points out, is if this is the limit of our ambitions for next season and beyond, ie to field a team that can't compete in every facet of the game.

Who got MOM? Can anyone have pipped Temata?

Nobody's mentioned the collectors' item - a 50 yard Ward break. That and an O' Callaghan try. Hasn't J 0' C gone up a notch the last few matches.

He won a Premiership in reserve grade with the Roosters playing there. He's played first grade for Manly there. He played a lot of his aussie career there. He was bought by London to play there.


I take it, he's not doing something right there at the mo then?

I'm disappointed also, but not because we were dire - but because we didn't go in at half time in the lead. I thought we dominated the first 40. We weren't even really outplayed in the second half, but with Howell off and Lamont versus Richards in a catching contest it was a matter of time before they scored enough points on that side to win the game.
Of course that could be the beer talking....

O'C got both MOM's

The issues I have are

We have the best hooker from last year playing 7
We have an ex int 7 playing 9
We have a GB 13 playing 12
We have an ex GB FB sat in the stand
We have a player we have signed for 4 years who is progressing as a good 6 sat in the stand
Our top scorer who has chimed into the line from FB stuck yesterday at 6
A prop forward in LMS who[u never[/u wins the contact going forward and in defence
A cente that is forever running out the line and leaving gaps
A centre wing partnership in Clubb/O'C that has been thrashed in several games- Riley 5 tries, HKR Whelam 4 tries and multiple others-
Using 3 of the bench rather than 4

I despair with it.

The annoying thing is we have a reasonable team/squad-its the utilisation of the players and a firm playing structure that appears to be lacking.

Why when we get 10 metres from the line do we automatically go wide against a set defence- why not bang a couple in close to the middle sucking in the defence creating gaps out wide then go for broke- Saints bang Graham in, Wire Morley, Leeds leululi etc. We tap and put a 20 metre pass on whilst the defence just comes up and tackles as it is set

Does McDermott not think other coach study the opposition

They can read us like a book

No, it's more like a pamphlet!

I have to admit to agreeing with Listy - I thought Ganson had an excellent performance - probably the best refereeing display at The Stoop all season. It was true Ganson when he sin-binned Joel Tomkins and reversed the penalty. Superb!

It was as clear as day that with the territory we had towards the end of the first half and an inability to look like scoring that the game was gone. Our speed running on to the ball is non-existant and we seem to be actually slowing down as we run towards the opposition defensive line all the time.

I hate to say it, but I think now, with Catalans getting players back on the pitch we will, barring a miracle, finish bottom. To make the mood even grimmer, I think next season will be little better, I can see a lot of players leaving (Orr back to Cas is the latest on the rumour mill), and they'll be replaced either by hopefulls from Championship, Championship One, or players who can't get into the starting line up at the lesser Super League clubs.

As Dorn plays now at SO, what he's doing wrong is failing to stand back and assess the options, he's just too keen to get in the play and use his pace, he's all action, too much action. Against a weak defence that works some the time, but against a defence as organised as Wigan's it hasn't a hope.

Have to agree with the positives about Ganson yesterday. I thought he did a superb job.

Is he for real-there is having ago and there is having a go. No successful team in the history of RL has played without a set of forwards. Teach LMS, Ward, Esders, Clubb to run hard and set a platform, suck in defenders and then lets go wide and throw it around-thats what leeds, Saints have been doing for years. Wigan have done very little different this year, they have the same players but they are fitter, more eager in defence, and run hard. Its not science

We were dreadful yesterday apart from 2 or 3 five minute spells we were totally lethargic, no go forward, no pace, players receiving the ball at walking pace, poor support play and clueless in attack.

I think I must have been watching a different game to BM........the worry is that I spoke to Luke Dorn after the match and he seemed to think that the team played ok!!!

Even though they had players missing and were not at their best it was a stroll in the park for Wigan, when just like Leeds a couple of weeks ago we had a great opportunity to capitalise on the situation. We messed up yet again and Ganson had a decent game, so had nothing to do with the result.

Great travelling support from Wigan as per usual.

Don't think our forwards were bad against Wigan. The platform was clearly set.

Anybody got any news on Howells?

Yes, he doesn't play for us.

"Popped his collarbone" I read somewhere. I think that happened on the first hit up of the game when he went in to tackle Prescott (?) and received a forearm to his chest.

No idea how serious a "popped collarbone" is.

Double post, sorry.

i dont know where you think the collar bone is, but it wasn't the bit he was holding. he looked injured from the first tackle. the lowest point for me was when dorn caught the ball 10 meters out and stood still, whilst a committee meeting took place as what to do next, closely followed by bryants bitch slap of tackle at the death. rubbish. we have so little penetration we need ron jeremy as forward coach.

It was either his collarbone or shoulder, I saw him come up strapped up at the start of the second half.

IIRC correctly it was Howell who caught Tomkins when he broke down field. A great effort with an injury!

I thought we did OK on Saturday against the league leaders. Maybe I'm becoming conditioned to a level of mediocrity? I felt we competed well in most departments for the first three quarters of the game, the one glaring difference being Wigan's superior speed fo both thought and movement close to the tryline. Quins just didn't look capable of unlocking their defence as we needed to. When we pulled them back to 12-20 midway through the second half there was till a theoretical chance we could win, but realistically I couldn't see us catching them without shipping more tries ourselves. In the final quarter we seemed to run out of steam as a good Wigan side ran away with it. I thought Sam Tompkins was very impressive and I hardly noticed Ganson, so I guess he did a good job too.

He didn't seem to be all that keen to support Randall when he made a couple of breaks. One pass and it would have been a try.