how long are people gonna bang on about watts? hes gone and had to if what most say are true, might as well start talking about paul cooke again, or shaun Briscoe, ellis is the one we miss imo, a true leader,

Unfortunately with Taylor a main player in our team it wasnt possible.
I have posted before that this all kicked off in Australia

It's not old news though, is it, because we are still suffering the consequences.

Of course it’s old news and has nothing to do with here and now. The fact we didn’t recruit new faces is the problem here and now.

I said before the oz trip it was a bad move by the club. If we lost watts due to an incident there then it was monumentally disastrous

I cannot understand why Radford doesnt pick Brad Fash, he is gonna be the best prop in the world in a few years. Total wrecking bull like O'Meley, he is a fantastic prop, the 2nd best prop in the city. Cannot understand why he isnt been played.

Like Mtongogo- Similar to Petero Civoniciva in his hard running, the front row looks good for F.C if they continue in the way they are playing.

Top post.
Did it take you long?

currently i'm seeing parallels with the way the 2005/6 team was slowly dismantled. then we lost swain, cooke, mcmenemy, chester, briscoe and didn't replace like for like. we eneted an extended period of mediocrity (albeit the disastrous decision to sack sharp didn't help matters). we have lost fonua, ellis, watts and replaced none of them like for like

what is a wrecking bull?

Is it possible we can kick start our campaign, by beating the possible world club champions in their own back yard. And all will be well in the world. Come on you ull.

NO

I'm hoping that mini and manu are suffering the after effects of injuries last year and will be better once fully fit. It's easy to forget that a number of our current "fit" players missed big chunks of last year which has to have an effect. Add sneyd, griffin and westerman in plus green, kelly and bowden yet to return.

good point

Hernias are not always as simple to sort as you might imagine. Dai Greene.... https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/athletics/46360029

Hernias are not always as simple to sort as you might imagine. Dai Greene.... https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/athletics/46360029

I'd say we really need to be a lot more clever when we have the ball. Getting bundled in to touch (Faraimo on a couple of occasions), Litten kicking in the first tackle after making a break. Just dumb play.

That said, if the TV camera's were not there, I reckon we win that game. Connors disallowed try for obstruction would not have been picked up. There would have squared it up and we had the wind in our sails at that point.

On a separate note, I really hope the RFL do something about this rule, it makes dummy runners pointless near the line, its supposed to be a physical contact sport FFS.

I don't understand why we have not got an absolute monster on our bench like others seem to have. Junior Moors at Cas, Pauli Pauli at Wakey...why are we not in the hunt for this style of player?

Salary cap.

More like , poor recruitment and retention!

And once they are we will go on a ten match unbeaten run,get to Wembley once again and reach the Grand Final.
That was just a dream Jake

As much as I would like it to be a case of that we have to accept that mini & sika are not youngsters and time has inevitably caught up with them both. Both have been great players fir us and have been integral in the success but time doesn’t stand still for anyone. We should have not extended their deals as both not only take a chunk of cap space but also quota spots.

I wasn’t the biggest fan of Pritchard in terms of true value but didn’t think we utilised him properly. However when he was here we had genuine impact off the bench and teams couldn’t live with us. Now you look at our bench and we have nothing anywhere close to worrying teams in terms of impact. Paea looks finished whilst he was good for ya first tine round it’s clear time is up for Mickey at this level. When Green & Bowden return it will be half a dozen games before they settle into the rigours of SL again.

We needed to makes changes and adapt the way we play as we can’t play the power game and apart from Shaul & Litten we have no real pace in the team. We will struggle regardless until the Coaching team correct the issues that stare us all every week in the face.

The recruitment or lack of this close season has been very poor and certainly not improved us or addressed the issues all its done is fill the roster with average players.

That is what’s disappointing that we still see the same issues and seem to have learnt or accept the issues

Good post that Pritchard had a real presence in the team when teams saw him and Ellis come on after 30 minutes for say Watts or Bowden and Taylor the intensity actually went up and you could see they feared the worst. Really we haven't replaced either of them or Watts (nor Fonua really) and now our forwards just get marched down the field and we just can't seem to slow that roll down. Fans want to see exciting signings I know, but squads need breaking up a bit too with new and respected newcomers coming in to change the dynamic too. I can't help but think that it's all a bit cosy at present and that there has been a bit too much sentiment in our retentions this year.

I THink youve missed the point. We resign aging players who we could see last season not having the impact they once had yet other teams sign these massive south sea islanders who can make a real impact.

Lazy recruitment

Contracts were being negotiated when we were in a run of 8 wins from 10, hardy "not having the impact they once had".

Check back 9 months, there weren't refences to "Lazy recruitment" then, far from it.

No one could have anticipated the crippling injuries that wrecked the season in more ways than one.

I do wonder if a lot of the problems we have now are down to pearson replacing motu tony with ellis. It's easy to blame radford but I would guess his input into recruitment would be identifying positions he wants to recruit into and discussing those players other then identify as options.

I think james clark is now in charge of recruitment so I can't see it improving much

I know the club wouldn't come out And say it, but I reckon this season as already been written off, already looking towards 2020 , hence Pearson backing of radford