They are so so bad. I watched ST Helens Richardson put the ball flat on the kick off tee and made it so hard for our players to catch every kick off. We will kick off every single time and it will go to the teams best winger and they could literally catch it using 1 hand its pathetic. I would much rather see Huby kick it with a big toe bung and ask some questions of the opposition I want to see some diversity.

You post this every year whenever we have a bit of a losing run.
Are will do the same most of the time.

Think Fridays loss came as big shock for a few fans for me our desire to defend was embarrassing

NGB4C does get things right some times you know, and I think he's bang on with this one. I also noticed that he places it flat and appears to put hell of a lot of spin on it making it more difficult to catch. The opposition receiver doesn't even have to move off the spot when we restart.

This isn't a comment on our kick-offs, as very few teams do anything original, but I am always surprised teams don't show more invention here, given that you get the ball back if it bounces out of play. Is it so hard for a kicker to drill it low and hard towards the sidelines? The unpredictability of the bounce would make it slow to collect, and you might get a few going out. Or is it hard to aim it to hit the ground if it has a flat trajectory?

The additional benefit is that teams would stop going for the two on penalties if the result is the opposition with a good chance of getting the ball back.

As for us, we do what nearly every team does: play the percentages.

You're spot on fella. They are completely turd. It's pretty annoying albeit a small aspect of the game.

while he posts some real drivel at times he does have a point, I've seen some very poor kick offs with no creativity to put pressure of the return, I too would like to see at least some effort put in to it

Almost seems as though we look for the opposition fullback and kick it to him, every time. No variety whatsoever. Is there a problem with at least varying it left to right?

CC even pointed it out in his post match interview ! We need some kind of a change from the start with scotty not making the distance.

Also what about when we receive the ball from a kick off - we have to be the worst team in stats for the last 2 years ,in either making a mistake from the kick off or that set of six.

In this day and age most coaches will scrutinise games minutely, including kick offs and which works best.
We had the same debate on our board and it seems Powell likes it to go high to the part of the pitch where we want the opposition to start their first set. I.E. Left corner and keep them down there but this obviously needs the ball to go high and a good chase.

Why does Grix take the drop outs too, did I dream our stand off making a 50 odd yarder against Catalan.

Poor kick offs have been the order of the day for as long as I can remember. It must be written into each new coach's contract and handed out as an instruction along with the players shirt.
Once saw Craig Hall do a fantastic low hard short kick off to the left that bounced straight into Ben Cockaynes hands. Try from same set. At Headingley, can't remember if we rescued the game or not though?

Have to agree. You might as well chuck the ball to the opposition from the halfway because our kick offs usually end up straight in the opposing full back's arms. We're completely unadventurous and don 't seem to want to compete for the ball.

I think our whole kicking game is poor. It's the same kick off every time, don't get anything (not that I expect it every time) from our drop outs and then when we get a half decent opportunity to make some yards on the back of a penalty we kick 10 metres downfield and it's been the same for as long as I can remember, look at every other side who make 30+ metres from penalties and what you can make on the back of it.

I've been saying for while now that we should also try a quick drop-out too...all defending teams throw the ball behind the dead ball line and then take an age recovering it (obviously to give them a breather having undoubtedly just had to defend 5 tackles), but why not get all the players quickly back behind the try line and take a quick kick towards the touchline to try and find touch whilst the opposition are jogging back into position and catch them unawares ??
That way instead of facing another set of 6 to defend, we get the ball back from the resultant scrum

Most sides kick deep and try to be sure of who will be bringing the ball out and although we spectacularly failed to deal with this against Warrington for their try straight after ht, this is the norm for most sides, unless its a tight game and then you can expect to see a short kick.
Variation sounds great but, if any side goes for a short kick off or puts one along the ground, the risk is that the opposition start their first set a lot closer to the half way line and there would be even more complaints on here were that to happen.
Our kick offs have got rock all to do with our results and fans only moan about it when we've failed to come up with a miracle play from the kick off.
Either make it a contest or, kick as deep as you can, there isn't too much else that can be done.
Would it make any difference if we kicked left, right or, straight, I dont think so

Agree that kick offs are a small part of the game, however ours are particularly poor. Most teams kick high and deep to give time for the defence to get down and pin the opposing team in, however like with our in-play kicking, we don't seem to get the required height to have a decent chase. As somebody has already mentioned, Richardson's kick-offs were hard to deal with. He tees the ball up and strikes it on its side, a few other teams have the ball facing backwards so they can get the height which sets the opposing team off on the back foot but Grix seems to tee it up like a conversion and Jowitt does the same tbh.

What I don't understand is that RL is clearly a game of inches and gaining marginal advantages, it really wouldn't be hard to have the fullbacks spend an extra 10-15 minutes per session on getting a decent kick off in.

And don't get me started on the drop-outs. Grix looks like he genuinely cannot be d trying to strike the ball. Watching Sneyd have Leeds receive the ball on their own 40 the other night highlighted what a difference it can make.

To summarise, no not a massive part of the game but one that we could definitely improve on and should do if we are to close the gap with the top teams.

To be fair. We got the ball back twice v Salford from short kick offs. So did vary them.
Unfortunately it didn't help because we couldn't have broken through crepe paper. Crepe, a very apt word there.

Nothing to do with results but everything to do with overall mentality.

All this moaning about predictable kick offs but, how many sides that we have played have varied their tactics from restarts.
The answer is none.
Some sides do kick the ball better that us, be that from a restart or during the game and I would suggest that neither Miller or Finn are the most powerful kickers in SL.
Our attacking kicks lack height and we tend not to get a lot of hang time but, our restarts aren't any better or worse than the sides that we've played.
As I said in my previous post, Trinity, along with most other sides go for depth and try to defend from there.
Sorry, but our kick offs have nothing to do with the teams mentality and as I said, nobody even mentions it when we win.
It's just another topic to moan about when we lose.

Apart from handling errors and controlling the ball, our biggest problem at Salford and it will be the same at Cas on Friday, will be matching their line speed, both in attack and defence. Our kick offs, as long as we dont kick the ball dead, will be just fine.

I would even be tempted to add in last tackle kicks to this.

When kicking from deep we very rarely find touch or turn opponents around, and therefore defensive tackle counts start much nearer our line than hoped.

Now, last tackle kicks, I agree with and they're far more important than re starts.
You either need to kick for field position or challenge for the ball (either with a chip, bomb or grubber) and we are very poor in this area.
How many repeat sets do we get and how many times do we score from kick plays ?

I know which I'd be spending time practicing.

I suppose the trick is to only kick off once in a game!!!! I have to say that loads of people in the north stand against St. Helens thought our kicks going to Lomax every time was a bit stupid. Are you really telling me we can't at least kick it somewhere else instead of straight to a bloke whose job it is to catch balls? (I refer to the number on his shirt not the position he is currently playing).