HKR still pursuing Ben according to Mondays Hull Daily Mail

What are peoples thoughts on this?

He was pretty much washed up before we came in for him and gave him the stage to develop into an England squad member. Would have thought he'd want to stay given the chance.

I always thought his best asset was his versatility which is priceless in a small squad. Though that's rarely been used in recent times he's still proved to be an effective SL winger.

I like Ben and he has good go-forward but he's the same as Fox - a liability in defence and defending kicks. When was the last time he scored a try?

Ben is a good player and gets us going when the forwards need a breather. However I think that if we get a good amount of money for him we should sell and replace hopefully with a younger player.

If someone like Kaye is ready to step up why not.

I like Ben, he has come and knuckled down. We were good for him. He is good for us.

He has limitations as mentioned but adds alot going forward. If the offer is a serious one then it should be considered but only if we can secure as good a replacement.

Guess its watch this space. If be happy to see him stay. If he goes I'd also be ok with it if we had a wingman in our sights/secured who was of good quality.

Keep him

Would be happy enough if we got a fee from KR.
Ben's been on the whole very good for us but needs to cut out the dumb play & mistakes.

Don't think he'll attract big money so keep him if not. Solid player and really helps with go forward.

been in hull today and rumour round there is that they are after kyle amor as well!

Most of SL ought to be

Do Leeds still have first dibs if Kyle chooses to leave Wakey? If they do I'm surprised they haven't already tried to sign him. I'd certainly rate him above Moore and Bailey.

If I were Ben I would be telling KR to do one and yes he brought things about himself but they wanted rid of him.Like Fox he gives a lot when going forward but thats countered by the defending slips.

Nope they did but gave him up hes on a Trin only contract.

As I have said on a different thread, for effort at the moment I prefer Fox to Cockayne.

I would say if the price is right, then let him go, if not keep him, but he has to work on his defence, and for his place

There seem to be a lot of people criticising Ben's defence on this thread but I would say that a large percentage of those "errors" are down to the way we as a team defend. If Ben is doing what he is being asked of by the coach then are the defensive mistakes all his fault??

When the going gets tough, Ben puts his hand up and gets stuck in. He takes a lot of pressure off the forwards down the middle. As someone has mentioned, the fee we would likely to get off KR, would not cover Ben's value to the team.

This is exactly the problem. How many times have we seen both Ben and Foxy come inside and leave the opposing winger with a walk in try? I've lost count! Why do they do it? because there's a bloody great gap with no defender in it! If they didn't come inside and try and fill it the opposing centre would have a walk in. The wingers get the blame but you can't leave a winger exposed and expect him to defend against 2 and 3 attackers!
We have 2 wingers who may not be the best but they give their all. Leave them alone I say they are not the reason we have lost matches we should have won!

Excellent post.
I think Ben's kick returns are second to none, it takes it out of the defenders and gives our forwards a rest.

going forward the back 3 are great in general, get us plenty of penalties with quick play the balls etc. My issue is that we are absolutely exposed when defending a high ball on either wing, we dont compete for the ball, certainly we dont win enough in the air. if thats a defending tactic of waiting for the player to land I dont know, but IMO something needs to change as we lose too many games from not being able to handle this attacking option against us.

It's incredibly hard for a winger to see the overlap, get off the mark, come inside and hit the centre before the overlap takes place.

I know a lot of people say "stick with your winger, if the centre goes over then it's the centre's fault" ....but surely no 'team' should play like that. If you lose 48-0 but neither winger goes over, you'd not come off the field feeling smug.

Overlaps end where the winger is and start at the PTB - it's just the winger who in the end has to deal with the impossible 2-1 situation.

Leaving the centre to walk in is silly if you have even a 1% chance of hitting him and stopping the ball getting out to the winger.

I hate to say it, but loko at the Rhinos, they rarely ever get overlapped cause of their line speed being fast in unison - not casue they've got two good wingers (though it obviously helps)

I think a lot of teams wingers do come inside when defending, I think it is a trait that is widespread.

I seem to remember a while ago, maybe 2 seasons ago, on Boots n All where Paul Cullen was summarising on defensive lines. I think ironically it was our game.

He said that when players are defending, you have two at marker and a lot of the time he was seeing where if the centre for example had made a tackle, and was in at the play the ball or at marker he was out of his centre position. I f the rest of the line didn't adjust accordingly then this left a hole, which the attacker would run straight through or sometimes this causes the winger to come inside, and again leaving the hole out wide.

It is Mathers job to call pull left or right as and when.

This used to happen under Kear's regime and could well be still happening now

I think we should hold on to Ben and maintain the back row as it is. It is not Cockaynes fault that games have not been won when perhaps they should have been. Ben is not playing at 100% at the moment but you can bet he will eventualy rediscover himself and start scoring again. I think Agar and Eslon should make it their priority to hold on to the team we have now. If we can keep the squad they will have a better chance of coming off the starting bocks with a vengance next season. Obviously we do need to think about players that will leave for various reasons, retirement etc and that is why we still need to drip feed talent into the team like Agar has done by bringing Touson into the pack. You cannot keep making "fresh starts" like Wakefield have been doing for years after being a selling club. Just look at the starting line ups for most of the clubs in SL and there is a gaggle of ex Wakey players who, on the whole, are playing good football.

The art of the centre giving his winger some protection when the high ball comes over has disappeared. The winger can't do it all himself from a standing jump against a player on the run. His team mates need to give him some protection.

In defence of the wingers, for much of the season their inside men have been Lynn and L Smith neither of whom would fill me with confidence in their defensive capabilities if I were stood outside them.
Granted both have made individual clangers but the some of their parts over the course of the season probably balances out.

Remember when we played Wigan at home Lyne and Cockayne on one side and Collis and Fox on the other side, all the trys were scored down foxys' side - however its just the defensive way we play, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.