Regardless of the reasons for ours and Saints tries the point still stands, teams are looking at your right side and thinking "i fancy a few points on that wing, personally i do think Charnley is your weak link in defence.

I'm sure you guys have the game with us on DVD or recorded on TV etc, look at Kings try 2nd half, he actually runs over Charnely, he doesn't try to go round him because he thinks why risk going in to touch when the guy won't tackle me.

Great going forward i'll concede.

How he got man of the match nominations for what equated to a shimy that led to a try and a try i'll never know, he did bugger all else

I thought he had a very good first half. Interception 10 yards out, few good runs to relieve pressure and dealt with everything Foster and Meli threw at him.

I hope teams keep testing josh .Because they obversely under estimate him . Teams keep getting there fingers burnt with his full lengthers and half breaks



So keep it coming

Sorry Ste but I think you're being a little unfair there pal; Matt King's a great player and can steamroller most in his path. Josh Charnley's a kid who's learning fast; breaks and tries aside, he makes some great hard yards and takes pressure off the forwards. He's getting better with exposure; sure, we'll haemorrhage more tries on that wing as people will play percentages and go for them but watching them regularly, with replays, I can see that side getting stronger and stronger.

Watching the Wigan team week in week out it becomes obvious that he's no worse than the other defenders on the right hand side. The way Wigan defend means that the winger is always likely to be left with some very difficult decision to make because he'll be left dealing with an overlap quite often.

Wigan's weak link in defence is Deacon without a doubt mainly because his decision making isn't great. He also has to be moving forward in order to put enough power in his tackles to bring a man down meaning he's more likely to rush at a player and a quick pass will usually create an overlap.

Yes, Matt King ran right over Charnley but he's done the same thing to many players in his career. He's run through better wingers than any that England have to call upon. King just happens to be a fantastic player.

Charnley didn't really do much wrong for Foster's first try. They created a bit of space and Joel Tomkins allowed Meli to run on his outside. Joel does this quite often because he likes to grab the shirt collar and try to swing the man into touch. He's done this successfully a few times but it does mean that the player is likely to get on his outside. It would have appeared to Charnley as if Joel had been beaten so he had to go for Meli, who was clever enough to slip the pass out wide.

For Foster's second try it was Sam Tomkins who was at fault along with Deacon. Deacon misread it slightly and created an overlap. Joel took his man as did Charnley. The ball managed to come to Foster out wide but Sam Tomkins went for Meli too instead of moving to cover the wing.

Any team could have conceded those tries though. Split second decision making in an important game is something that you tend to get right more as you get older and more experienced.

From that distance King would have gone over/through any winger in the league.

Charnley and Tomkins are developing week on week. Not long ago they were being caught out by short kicks behind them, the first try was down to brilliant centre play by Meli; sometimes you have to accept that you were out done by better play. Any try can be blamed on poor defence; but fans tend to regard the tries their team scores as fantastic and the try their teams let in as poor defence.

Remember that JC is actually a centre and JT is a second row main point i think.

It is very difficult for JT in the centre particular in defence.
He isnt the quickest thinker and what ever he decides in that split second will bring about either a try scored or try saved.

I think it is being slightly overlooked the fact that Deacon is also there and being the smallest player plus an important part of our attack makes him a taret no matter what. Wigan did the same to Johnny Lomax, he took a heavy knock because JT tried to run straight over him.

We are all looking for excuses to why the tries are being scored that way but I bet many other SL clubs have similar problems when facing our left side attack.
Francis Meli and Jamie Foster probably scored most of Saints tries so it cant be JT and JC being poor.

The end outcome is normally from good work inside off dummy runners who hold up defenders because if it was that simple Charnley would move up fast and be on the opposition winger if not the centre but a long cut out pass will bring about more questions.

If difficult to say trust your inside man because if you look at Meli first try he arc's round from Joels left shoulder to his right shoulder meaning Charnely is attracted in to close the gap between him and Joel, if Meli steps then you would expect Deacon or HH to be there to help JT with the tackle.

I'd say Charnley don't trust your inside man as he hasn't a clue on how to defend as a centre. Just a pity and a shame that Gleeson doesn't play for us anymore, then no one would be critisising Charnleys defence.

Really? Because Goulding was faced with pretty similar situations when defending outside Gleeson last season and he got plenty of unjust criticism for it.

I think your all insane, your looking at the best defensive team in uk history and your looking to find fault , to me it looked that the whole team didnt slide quick enough and it was just quick play that caught them out , your never going to get to a stage where you dont concede any tries and you still have the best defence, enjoy it .

even as someone who had to painfuly endue the 90's and Wigans domination , this side is a pleasure to watch and to be honest i quite enjoy watching them these days on how well they deconstruct other teams and just break them down doing the basics very well, I certainly think this team would beat any other english team from any era

I think he had a blinder! His work rate ws top class as ever. His scoots from acting half back helped keep the forwards fresh and his defence was good enough for me. As a few have said, the whole slide was slow which left him with a tough decision to make.
I think he showed he is not a winger when he broke through though. An out and out winger would have been able to do an in and out and beat Wello on the outside. He had enough time, space and pace to do it be just ran a straight line which made it easy for Wello. Don't get me wrong Wello did well to stop him but I'd love to have seen him go in and out.
guaranteed starter for me next season.

What do you mean 'he showed he's not a winger'? If he's been a winger all his career and he's excelling on the wing right now, and has basically nailed down a starting spot on the wing then he's a winger!

so whats the leeds left side pairing?...Ablett and Hall?...a 2nd rower in the centre??
i think leeds will attack out other side...they have more pace down that flank

I concede that you're generally a good poster but in this instance you're way off the mark. He made 2 game busting runs in what was a very tight match, something that no other player from either side was able to manage and that includes players of the quality of Roby, Richards, Tomkins etc. That's why he got nominations for top 3 MOM. That's before you get to his intercept, great work bringing the ball out and generally good defence. One instance where he was (perhaps) caught out of position does not a bad match make. He was excellent yesterday, as he has been for much of the season. His 19 (?) tries many, if not most, made by great work from himself are testimony to that!

As for 'weak link' in defence, you couldn't be more wrong. Deacon is the weak link. Even his most ardent admirers for what he does for this team (and I include myself in that) wouldn't argue with that. Charnley is unfortunate in that he defends on the same right hand side as Deacs and alongside a centre with little experience in that position. If you wish to use the King example as evidence that he is a weak defender then the same can be said for practically every player King has played opposite throughout his career. In fact, the same can be levelled back at King himself as I've seen him run over and past as if he wasn't there on occassion. Doesn't make him a bad defender. Every player has that at times during their career...more so when they are first coming into the game.

I think his defence is the only thing that is stopping him from being in contention for an Four Nations place. Briers embarrased him in the first game at the DW. Truely devastating attacking player though.

I remember the same arguments going round about Ainscough when he was here. "Poor under the high ball" after King outjumped him a couple of times, "should hold his wing and trust the player inside him" after he got beaten in 2 on 1 situations after a poor slide inside him.

They were mostly unjust criticisms of him as well.

As has been said already, poor reads and overcommittment inside will create overlaps out wide, and most wingers, no matter how good they are, cannot cover them without the attacking centre making a bad read. On the occasions that the inside defenders held their line, the outside coped admirably all day.

Agree about Goulding, he should be Charnleys centre IMO but for him being injured.

How about swapping Deacon and Finch when defending. Left side of defence could carry deacon . Right side would be Hansen,Finch, JT and Charnley. Finch is very good at marshalling the troops. Deacon seems to get sucked in which in turn sucks JT in leaving Josh out numbered.

Its fine, its just a little chink in a our steely defence, nothing needs to be changed at all this season

JT is not a centre. Charnley needs to stick to his wing.

Apart from that our right side is watertight.......

Would it be worth testing a partnership of

Sam
Roberts
Charnley
Carmont
Richards

in the next two games? With JT back in the back row

Charnley has been a revelation on the wing, why move him? It makes sense to let him hold down that position. For all the criticism Tomkins is getting, Saints attacked the right hand side defence time and time again and yet only scored twice. One of those tries definitely had nothing to do with any of the fringe defenders and another perhaps was but was also a bit of excellent skill from Meli.
The reason Saints were able to attack the right hand side so much was due to perhaps one or two harsh calls by the ref, some silly penalties conceded and a lack of field position early on. If players don't make too many mistakes or give away penalties that allow the right hand side to be targeted repeatedly then it's not a massive issue, as it's not really any weaker than the defence of many other teams.

I hope Im wrong but I cant see Amos Roberts playing for the first team ever again.

He was training with O'Carroll yesterday afternoon, it tends to be the long term injured training at this time Hock(before his return) and Feilden (before pec injury) were on the afternoon shift as well.