Very disappointing once more, to see a game that might well have been won slip away.
Plenty of huff and puff today, but not a lot of guile and skill - I think Macca is right to describe a lot of our play as 'dumb'. And I don't buy the tiredness excuse, Wakefield had a game on Friday too, so there was no fundamental reason why that would be a disadvantage.
Looking at a few individuals. Solomona looks well short of any kind of match fitness, made no contribution apart from throwing out a couple of ridiculous passes that went to ground. Worrincy is hesitant and soft in defence, and was at fault for the Atkins try - not the first time his tackling technique has been found wanting this season. Jeffries went missing too often, and Burgess is looking like a shadow of the player of last seaason. Lynch gets 100% for guts but obviously wasn't fit and shouldn't have been playing IMO - I hope that he is not expected to backup and play on Friday otherwise he risks serious long term injury. Surely Crossley (or a recalled James) for prop.
On the positive side Kopczak looked eager and made some good inpact runs, Newton had his best game of the season, Menzies was good and Halley did very little wrong.
Did he miss a tackle down their left wing which let a try in (was it Atkins'?)?
Very disappointing once more, to see a game that might well have been won slip away.
Plenty of huff and puff today, but not a lot of guile and skill - I think Macca is right to describe a lot of our play as 'dumb'. And I don't buy the tiredness excuse, Wakefield had a game on Friday too, so there was no fundamental reason why that would be a disadvantage.
Looking at a few individuals. Solomona looks well short of any kind of match fitness, made no contribution apart from throwing out a couple of ridiculous passes that went to ground. Worrincy is hesitant and soft in defence, and was at fault for the Atkins try - not the first time his tackling technique has been found wanting this season. Jeffries went missing too often, and Burgess is looking like a shadow of the player of last seaason. Lynch gets 100% for guts but obviously wasn't fit and shouldn't have been playing IMO - I hope that he is not expected to backup and play on Friday otherwise he risks serious long term injury. Surely Crossley (or a recalled James) for prop.
On the positive side Kopczak looked eager and made some good inpact runs, Newton had his best game of the season, Menzies was good and Halley did very little wrong.
Menzies is playing really well and stood out for me today. But its not down to one player. I thought we did really well to get back into the game. At halftime it wasn`t looking good. Goal kicking was issue its about time sam was given a go !!! Overall we made some silly offloads and some uneccessary errors that cost us the game and wakefield just got the bounce of the ball at crucial times. Anyway Wires next......................
He probably doesn't want to he's always been a very reluctant kicker.
Well it would be fair to say the Atkins skinned him, yes. He was left exposed by Worrincy and another defender (that I don't recall.)
But overall I thought he had a decent game, was safe under high balls, and ran the ball out of defence well
Yes he was left exposed. My guess is that Platt would have had rather more chance of stopping Atkins - provided of course he did not have a brain fart in doing it - but Atkins takes some stopping. Halley also did rather more running across the face of the defence a la Platt too, I thought? Under the high balls he was sound - and various Wakey fans were saying they should pepper him, so they must have perceived a weakness there? - Overall though I think Halley did nothing to justify not keeping his place. IMO.
[Mick Gledhill mode]Screwed by the Ref yet again...[/MG Mode]
[Rhinos mode]Had it been on Sky We'd have won...[/Rhinos mode]
[Adeybull mode]...
OK, don't think the ref did us any favours. And that ending was just bizarre - was Tez complaining about the time, or that we should have had a penalty for a high tackle?
But...end of the day we lost - very narrowly and after a strong fightback which might have come off with ten seconds more on the clock - because we made too many errors and gifted them too much possession. Would everyone tend to agree?
Losing Crookes, Sol clearly not being fit, Lynch playing on one leg (how the HELL did he manage the stints he did - he looked dead by the end - should he have been played at all?) hardly helped. Plus missing Morro Deacs Nero and Godwin - was always a big ask against a side far above us in the table who coasted against Cas while we were slogging against Leeds. Won't get any sympathy from Wakey over injuries, of course!
The team looked tired out, mentally and physically - as you would expect after Friday. In the circumstances, I suggest they did pretty well and could - maybe with a better run of decisions and a few less errors - easily have come away with the points. No disgrace in the score.
Still nil points, mind we need some more runs on the board PDQ thats the trouble. But we were very close to them today despite the errors and tiredness.
Good to hear Bulls fans' reception for Moore, returning after his awful time out. Pretty depressing to hear the continual slagging off of Platt from people around us though.
I agree with what you say - however I must point out that you did actually play against a very weak Trinity pack. Front line props Sculthorpe, Stosic and Bibey (who pre injury form was quite exceptional for him) were all missing whilst Moore was playing his first match back from his well documented illnes.
Now it's all if's and but's and there is no guarantee that any of the players missing from either side would have made a difference. However I have no doubt that part of your comeback in the second half was due to the fact that your bigger pack was winning the arm wrestle in the middle which may not have been the case had we had some bigger more seasoned players available. It's just a detail but it's worth noteing.
We put this festival on you b*st*rds
With a lotta love
We worked for one year for you pigs
And you wanna break our walls down
And you wanna destroy us
Well you go to hell