Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 10:10 am  

To begin with I just want to see a team that actually looks like they know how to, and enjoy playing rugby. Last year was awful, I've not ever seen rugby so bland in my life.

I'm hoping for some good things from Field and Cust on the way of attacking threat, I hope Miski doesn't have to wait long for his chance as I can see him being a fan favourite. We all hope that Ellis and Mago actually play like props should, something we haven't had in many years.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 10:24 am  

I'd go with the general feeling on here, in that we'd hope to improve our on field performance. One area I feel we need to massively improve and think smarter is our field kicking, whether it be from our own half way line to turn the opposition around and enforcing great 'Waney style defence' to pin them in their own forty (like so many teams did to us last season).

Fifth and last needs a massive overhall, too many times we simply didn't put enough pressure on our opponents by just gifting them the final ball. Very rarely we scored a try, most of the time never looked like scoring on the last as the set moves were too slow with inaccurate passes thrown in.

I'd like to think we now have someone who will take control of this by either feeding the pass to score or putting in a grubber over the try line and forcing an error leading to either a try or a drop out. At worst we pin the opposition on their try line. Possession and territory is everything in this game.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 10:29 am  

Wigan with a couple of props added, French / Field / Cust available and the clown of a coach gone willl be a much, much stronger side than last year, even without Hastings (who to be honest I thought was pretty average for Wigan but the whole side weas so poor it's hard to know whether that was his fault).

Don't think it will be enough to win anything but certainly expect lots of improvement.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:52 am  

MattyB wrote:

I'd go with the general feeling on here, in that we'd hope to improve our on field performance. One area I feel we need to massively improve and think smarter is our field kicking, whether it be from our own half way line to turn the opposition around and enforcing great 'Waney style defence' to pin them in their own forty (like so many teams did to us last season).

Fifth and last needs a massive overhall, too many times we simply didn't put enough pressure on our opponents by just gifting them the final ball. Very rarely we scored a try, most of the time never looked like scoring on the last as the set moves were too slow with inaccurate passes thrown in.

I'd like to think we now have someone who will take control of this by either feeding the pass to score or putting in a grubber over the try line and forcing an error leading to either a try or a drop out. At worst we pin the opposition on their try line. Possession and territory is everything in this game.

I don't think that we have had a kicking game since Paul Deacon retired which is the best part of a decade.
If Tommy plays with regularity at best we will have half a kicking game and that assumes that Cust can actually kick.
It's part of the game that a player with average skills can actually improve pretty easily with practice and more practice.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 12:01 pm  

ChrisA wrote:

To begin with I just want to see a team that actually looks like they know how to, and enjoy playing rugby. Last year was awful, I've not ever seen rugby so bland in my life.

I'm hoping for some good things from Field and Cust on the way of attacking threat, I hope Miski doesn't have to wait long for his chance as I can see him being a fan favourite. We all hope that Ellis and Mago actually play like props should, something we haven't had in many years.

Last year was as bad a team as I've ever seen wear our jersey.
From a personal point of view I don't think we have played any decent entertaining rugby since 2013 with any sort of regularity.

I hope we will improve but with so many changes on and off the field I think that it is difficult predict how we will actually play.
We have a difficult start and I think that after the first two games we will know how the season will pan out.

The player that I'm looking forward to watching is Farrell. He has been starved of decent ball for seasons and I'm hoping that Cust and Smith will give him some gaps and time to enable him to make some inroads with his great running game.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 12:12 pm  

Big loss in Hastings, by far and away our best player last season. Hopefully Cust goes some way to replace him, don’t hold out much hope for Field, looks lightweight, lacking in confidence but bags of potential and lightning pace.
Hopefully we get a season out of French.
Gildart of old was a loss, but was a shadow of his former self last year, so in reality the loss of him was the season before last.
Looking forward to Bateman being somewhere near his Aussie form.
I think the one to watch is Ethan Havard, has the potential to be a real monster in SL, hopefully Waney brings that out of him.
I do hope the league becomes more competitive, I think Stains have lost a couple and the quality of replacements remains to be seen. They seem to have been relatively lucky with injuries in recent years and although they’ve won 3 in a row, but 2 of the 3 were by the narrowest of margins…..

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 12:24 pm  

nikos wrote:

Big loss in Hastings, by far and away our best player last season. Hopefully Cust goes some way to replace him, don’t hold out much hope for Field, looks lightweight, lacking in confidence but bags of potential and lightning pace.
Hopefully we get a season out of French.
Gildart of old was a loss, but was a shadow of his former self last year, so in reality the loss of him was the season before last.
Looking forward to Bateman being somewhere near his Aussie form.
I think the one to watch is Ethan Havard, has the potential to be a real monster in SL, hopefully Waney brings that out of him.
I do hope the league becomes more competitive, I think Stains have lost a couple and the quality of replacements remains to be seen. They seem to have been relatively lucky with injuries in recent years and although they’ve won 3 in a row, but 2 of the 3 were by the narrowest of margins…..

One man's lucky with injuries is another man's strong squad, sensible approach to blooding of youngsters, highly professional players and conditioning team.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 1:40 pm  

nikos wrote:

Big loss in Hastings, by far and away our best player last season. Hopefully Cust goes some way to replace him, don’t hold out much hope for Field, looks lightweight, lacking in confidence but bags of potential and lightning pace.
Hopefully we get a season out of French.
Gildart of old was a loss, but was a shadow of his former self last year, so in reality the loss of him was the season before last.
Looking forward to Bateman being somewhere near his Aussie form.
I think the one to watch is Ethan Havard, has the potential to be a real monster in SL, hopefully Waney brings that out of him.
I do hope the league becomes more competitive, I think Stains have lost a couple and the quality of replacements remains to be seen. They seem to have been relatively lucky with injuries in recent years and although they’ve won 3 in a row, but 2 of the 3 were by the narrowest of margins…..

From what I’ve heard very few if any people within the club will miss Hastings.
A talented player but not always a team player.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 2:56 pm  

FearTheVee wrote:

One man's lucky with injuries is another man's strong squad, sensible approach to blooding of youngsters, highly professional players and conditioning team.

It’s a combination of all of them IMO. There has to be more than luck to it but nobody can deny Saints have had some very good fortune with injury and illness these past few seasons (apart from the really bad luck of having some Covid cases for that spell just after the cup final).

You make your own luck as they say though. Clearly the conditioning team at Saints are doing a very good job, you only need to look at the shape Konrad Hurrell is in to see that.

Re: Realistic expectations this season? : Fri Jan 14, 2022 3:31 pm  

Blooding youngsters is easy when you have a fully fit side and there is no pressure on them. Playing them when you're missing 7 or 8 and they need to take the lead isn't as easy.

I've said it before and will say it again.....Saints have played a weak team 3 times in the last 3 years and lost every time. Take 7 or 8 out their side for a long period and the change in results will be as dramatic as ours has been.