But we can’t bank on defence when we’re seemingly incapable of scoring more than 3 tries a game. D is poor yes, but I’d argue our attack is worse. The defence automatically improves with an improvement in enthusiasm, intensity, conditioning, and desire - all of which IMO can only be achieved with a change in head coach & club culture generally.

For sure. I said upthread that Shorrocks looks due for a rest probably more than most, and although he has filled in briefly at dummy-half before, to ask him to play there for virtually a full game seems all wrong, all the more so when other choices were available.

We don’t stand a chance when 1 player is the sole focus of all our attack which is exactly the reason we are not scoring tries.

If I’m a defender against Wigan I look where Hastings is…..that’s it, job done. Easy work.

You are right but good teams earn the right to have games where they switch off defensively and they can still win because they’ll just out score the opposition. We can only win games by keeling teams under 20 points and more often that not, we need to keep them under 12-16 points. The attack is just diabolical. I said a few weeks ago I’d checked the average points per game of the team I’d consider to be Superleagues worst ever in Workington and they scored at the same average we were this season. Since then we’ve put just over 20 on Wakey, 18 on Salford, 50 on Leigh and 14 on HKR, so the average may have gone up by a few points (it was around 14 per game) but it’s just woeful.

Maybe when the really big games come we can be squeaky clean in defence and discipline and we can scrape the wins needed to get to another final but I just can’t see it. We just don’t have the tactical awareness to get us through games of that nature.

We won’t make the playoffs IMO
I’d be surprised if we win again this season
Lam is the the worst coach since Coslett. People under 50 please google.

Just rewatched the game.

Smith was hopeless.

1 pass in the first half when he managed some shape.

Kicking game shocking.

No service on the right.

2 needless penalties which gave KR field position to win the game, got put clean through from 20 m out…ran at the tacklers.

Body language was poor throughout the game, looked interested in the last 10 mins.

I’m sure he has potential but his attitude has a big ? over it.

Leagues turd, so we will make the top six but it’ll be by virtue of scraping past out of form teams. The most worrying thing from this season is that IMO. If we play a team in any sort of form we lose. If we play a team out of form, like Salford last week, Wakey the week before or Hudds in those two games, we can just about scrape home on the basis that they’re shocking and somehow worse than use.

Lam is just an horrendous coach for me. I’m still not writing this season off but it’ll be nigh on a miracle to turn it around with the deluded one at the helm. I’d have called Havard in to my office if I were Lam in the week, when he said we’d blown Salford away in that second half last week. I’d want to know how or why he felt that was us blowing a team away. If that’s a performance they’re Karting themselves on the back for, then I shudder to think what us now acceptable.

None of the team would get into Wigans 2nd team in the glory days

We all acknowledge the prop issue and it is significant.

The other major issue is the lack of quality in the spine of the team.

9-issue
7-Hastings superb
6. Issue
13. Issue
1. Quality.

You don’t need world beaters in the centres and on the wing if you have a quality spine.

Surely Millward?

I’d be happy with our spine for the rest of this season if we had a decent coach but he’s clueless. His comments on Morgan Smithies summed him up really. He spoke about how he’s been running the ball with more vigour and even though he knows he’s smaller than props/middles at other clubs, he’ll hold his own when he flogs him in there for rest of this season. So two alarm bells ring out to me straight away. 1-he’s been running with more vigour, making more ground and generally looking more comfortable in the second row but we’re moving him and 2-John Bateman has 13 on his back and we finally got to see him there in spells in the last two games and he had a good influence on the games but he’s done in there by the sounds of things.

I genuinely cannot wait to see the back of him. It’s such a shame that a great player for us will leave as a coach with the fan base letting out a collective sigh of relief but that’s what it will be. To not have to listen to his post match interviews again will be a pleasure.

I'm 43 .... no Google here.... is it Kel Coslett by any chance?

Best and most truthful post of the lot.

It's very frustrating. With ball in hand, we seem to have a 5 minute spell where we look like we know what to do, we then revert back to one out predcitable rugby.

In defence, the number of silly petulant mistakes is unacceptable and is killing us.

It says a lot that the best tackle of the game came from Jai Field on their big prop forward, absolutely crunched him. He also looked like lightening with the ball.

Yeah there was some great signs from Field, once fully fit he will be a definite asset. We just need our forward to do their job, and stop giving away stupid penalties

Hardaker again, great kick returner but nowhere to be seen chiming into the line in attack.

Field to FB for the rest of the year ?

Field has been signed to replace Hastings and play Stand Off with Smith at Scrum Half next season.


And he is not a regular full back unless of course, like the great David Bolton and Hastings plays there in an emergency!

And again the Oxford United fan was right, last night proves what he said to be true

I’ve had treatment to enable me to forget that name.
Now the nightmares start again.

I’m pretty sure it was Coslett at the helm when we got relegated.
The only reason we not with Leyth at the bottom is due almost entirely to Hastings.
At least we got shut of Millward when we finally realised that he was clueless.

Lam is totally and utterly useless. He would struggle at any level of the game in a coaching capacity.

You obviously have a high level of technical knowledge of the game from your posts and I’ve learned quite a bit about many aspects of play from your posts but your final sentence is one of the reasons why the game is on it’s arris and why my long love of the game is waning.

Please don’t take my post as a personal slur as I genuinely like your inputs and find them very insightful but in that sentence for me you have summed up why the game will never develop any real class outside backs because they are now almost superfluous to the game where any fit athletes can “do a job”

If Lam is so bad, perhaps you should ask Lenagan why he has never sacked him.

Perhaps he cannot afford anyone better!

Maybe he can’t afford anyone better so the best way to remedy that is to see increased gates.
Which stand will you be in next week?

I totally agree.

Athletes are now taking over.

The game is now becoming “money ball” where teams generally look for their outside backs to be extra forwards.

The cap also means that if you put together a quality spine you will have to make sacrifices in other positions.

I hope I’m wrong but I wouldn’t be shocked to see

1. French
2. Miski
3. Bibby
4. Thornley
5. Marshall
6. Field
7. Smith

As our starting backs next year.

We look to have significantly improved our middles, with the 2 additions, but unless we add quality to the spine I really think we struggle.

With Hastings going we desperately need to bring someone in.

The apparent lack of planning has created an issue in that we have lots of cap wrapped up in 3 specialist fullbacks hence the strong rumours surrounding Hardaker.

The truth is we only have ourselves to blame for this situation and it goes above just the coach. The leadership at the club have made significant errors in recruitment, retention and succession planning and it is one that will take more than one off season to address.

Our left edge last night made 71 carries, our right edge 34.

It’s hardly a challenge for defenders to understand where the attack is going and how they need to snub it out.

We have one of the most attack minded and creative secondrow forwards in the league and he is getting starved of possession due to lack of service.

It was noticeable KPP towards the end of the game was taking the ball up on the left too in an attempt to get into the game ball in hard.