But we've got cover for virtually every position in the squad of 30/31, so we DO have a reasonably full team. If Long and Horne are out then we have replacements. If the replacements aren't good enough, then the blame for that lies with the person that suggested they were good enough for a full time contract and a first team squad number (three guesses who that might have been) and the board for agreeing and signing them up.

Bottom line for me is that in a squad of 30/31, we do have enough to put out a full side of quality players, including playmakers.

that is a very good question that,mine would be st helens game doing the double over them,that game was a long time ago and that is the last game i really enjoyed.

I am making excuses because like I have said around 10 times he has got excuses! Over the last 3 years with our injuries et all NO TEAM would have done any better than us. Simple as. And as I said, if a number of our players get injured he will obviously have excuses again. No team has had as much to contend with as us over the last few seasons.

And yes Leeds had players out on Friday. But they still had there 3 main play makers (6,7,9) on the park. But, again, as I said I also thought Friday was a bad result and performance.

And to answer the question the last time I "really enjoyed" a Hull FC game - and I only go to home games - it was the last game of the regular season against Leeds - hardly years ago. Hope that helps.

Is that a fact, I very much doubt it.

Entirely sensible imo.

I think trotting the unlucky injury card wont wash this year, (surprised it did last year TBH)

definition of bad luck.

bad luck - an unpredictable outcome that is unfortunate.
- unnecessary and unforeseen trouble resulting from an unfortunate event.

I don't think it took Nostradamus to fortell Long and Horne will miss a big chunk of the season. You needed some reliable half backs and didn;t get any. Obst is a good little player but his best position is hooker not HB.

Suppose the big question (and maybe Agars saving grace) is whether Agar put his wishlist in and the BOD didn;t deliver or if he just didn;t highlight anyone at all.

Saints spent as much time without their 1st choice halfback pairing last season, strangely they went on to the grand final.

Yes, afterall, you've been saying the same thing for 3 years and look where that has got us.

Oh here we go, you don't like the opinion so start having a pop



I have not said the same, I said last year we had to make the top 8 at least but better still the top 6. We did that. This season top 6 is the minimum aim and we should be challenging for the top 4. I doubt we will and I have said all along we need to replace Agar to achieve success but he does not deserve to be sacked after two games.

In terms of numbers, frequency, and duration of injuries the only other side that's come close is Wakey IIRC. That's without looking at the detail of which positions have been missing.

There's no denying that Agar has had a tough time with the injury situation, and I was prepared to cut him some slack for that in terms of style of play and attacking prowess. It doesn't factor as an excuse for the lack of overall fitness, defensive structure, support play and general cohesiveness though.

Although Saints have much more quality in depth than we do, or a lot of other sides for that matter.

I know.



For some things, perhaps. Not for others. Lack of defensive line speed, no dummy runners, no backing up, defensive frailties on our right hand side - these are all things that ought to have been improved by Agar and haven't.



I don't think it is that simple. They might not have finished any higher in terms of league position, but the other problems could still have been addressed.

I wasn't having a pop, just stating facts, the people who keep Agar at the club are resppnsible for the situation, many of us have been saying for ages what you are saying now, he didnt deserve a contract extension and in all honesty he should be sacked.

You've said yourself that he's not the man to lead us to where we need to be. With this in mind, I can't understand why you're calling for him to be given time. If you thought there was a chance he would suddenly come good and lead us to Grand Final glory, I could see where you were coming from. I'd think you were totally bonkers, at least the calls for him to be given more time would make a little sense.

What I am saying now? I have said it for two years, I don't believe he can take us to a level were we are challenging for the major trophies. However last season he was told he would be judged on his side and he finished 6th. Due to that reason he has bought himself some more time with the board. If we win 2 fropm the first 7/8 macthes then the board may act. We might win our next three?

Either way it won't change my overall opinion of Agar.

IMO - which is unproven I don't think he will take us to any kind of glory.

Fact - he guided the team into 6th position last season which buys him more time as he achieved his objective.

If it were my call now I would get shut and appoint Noble but he could easily argue he deserves more time, things could look different after 8-10 matches, probably not but they might.

We'll be lucky to win two from the first seven or eight games Paul. We look miles away from winning a game and you can't see anything but defeats at Wigan and Huddersfield. We may beat Crusaders at home, but shouldn't we be doing that anway if we have any ambitions of being in the play-offs?

We appear to have managed to get this discussion spread across two threads. I've just answered similar points to these on the other one.

They certainly did. However despite all of that they managed to have there first choice pairing together for twice as long as we did - Horne/Long around 5 games I think, Pryce/Eastmond around 10. They also managed to have at least one of them as part of the pairing more than us also. In the last 2 seasons we have used 7 or 8 different half back combinations because of injury involving pretty much every combination of the following - Danny Washbrook, Tommy Lee, Shaun Berrigan, Adam Dykes, Richard Horne, Sean Long, Jordan Turner, Jordan Tansey and now Sam Obst.

Again - I think Agar has very justified exscuses - and again - I will judge him 5 or 6 games in with a resonably full side out week in week out.

What about the poor defensive line speed, the lack of dummy runners, the non-existent backing up, the right hand edge defence and interchanges. Are they all because of our lack of half back options?

Sorry but that is complete and utter b0llox!...we got sucked into the excuses for 2 seasons running, injuries not his team blah de blah...How come these excuses are not attributed to any other coaches in the league, Nathan Brown etc also inherited teams.

Well Huddersfield is a great example then and suddenly Nathan Brown is a great coach compared to Agar??.. Well despite the luxury of having to only use anything different than Kevin Brown/Luke Robinson/Danny Brough on 2 occasions all season I think (compared to our 7 or 8!) they finished a massive one point ahead of us in the league!!

But progressed significantly further in the play offs, and looked like they could mix it with the top sides. We, sadly, never.

Surely you do not consider Agar on the same par as Brown do you



Brown got further in the play-offs, his team also play very entertaining rugby which the fans enjoy.

They got further and got stuffed by St Helens?
As I said Nathan Brown had much more luxury than Agar last year but despite the entertaining rugby (which the fans enjoy) finished only 1 point above us??