When Kear was sacked I was absolutely against Dunning being given the job as I felt we needed things freshening up and it would just be a continuation of where we are at.
However he's convincing me so far. There are visible changes to the way we're playing. We're putting on some good attacking moves. Even Baldwinsons "barge over" try, it was him actually running at an angle back on the inside that created space for him to crash over. We're actually grubber kicking into the in-goal and forcing drop outs. He dropped the captain and even when he came back in, he was only in the bench. I know we've all be calling out Crossleys performances on here, but it's still easy to call for the captain to be dropped, but it's very different for the interim coach to make that call.
I know Widnes are in a state, but they were gash last year when we lost by a point and threw away a home play-off spot because we played so negatively of trying to hold on to a lead for 80 minutes. The culprit then walked straight back in the team for the remaining games.
As daft as it sounds, I think we could have still lost that game yesterday under Kear as when Widnes did score, the crowd lifted and they did improve. If we'd have just been a try ahead, we'd have got sucker punched like we have been multiple times. But because we'd actually attacked and built up a lead, as soon as we got that penalty it killed them off.
Sheffield is an acid test as they are a decent team this year. I'd still maybe prefer someone new and fresh to come in, but I'd certainly be ear marking Dunning for a couple years time.
