Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 8:27 am  

davey41 wrote:

I’ve always been a strong supporter of his as I feel there is a decent rugby player in there.

He is very much a confidence player and think his injury affected him more than we realise.

Not getting carried away, and I’m sure there will still be the odd brain fart and error, but he’s the sort of player TS could help enormously if he takes on board what he is being told?

For me, it is the small details that TS is instilling in the players. Savelio, change in attitdude. Brown stated in the HDM this week about the changes he has been working on. With McIntosh, the way he is running it in on exit sets, he is really hitting in between two defenders, and getting his nose through. Really impressive

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 8:31 am  

Never in doubt

Someone mentioned it above, but we have really had a hard time of it over the past few years. Hammerings, awful recruitment, all made going to games feel a chore. There is still plenty of work to be done, but it is clear that there is massive strides been made both on the pitch and off it in terms of attitude and culture. And it is all down to Tony Smith.

Huge result for our season, there's always a team that sneaks the play offs with a late push. Hopefully we keep players like Trueman/Clifford fit and it would give us a fighting chance.

[Chris71]

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 8:46 am  

HU8HFC wrote:

Huge result for our season, there's always a team that sneaks the play offs with a late push. Hopefully we keep players like Trueman/Clifford fit and it would give us a fighting chance.

If we can keep playing with that desire, effort and intensity from now until the end of the season we will give ourselves a chance and if not we can look back and say it wasn't for the lack of trying.
With results as they have been across SL I wouldn't like to predict anything as teams you'd expect to see win when looking at fixtures haven't. The teams above us will all lose points between now and end of the season as no doubt we will but it gives up a chance and something to aim for however slim that might be.

I said at half time to the guy next to me that if we lose the game I would be disappointed but would have no real complaints as the effort had been unreal in that first 40mins and thoroughly enjoyed it. When Bell scored in the 2nd we all must have had a thought of he we go St's are going to get on a roll but then to reply with another score ourselves I was pretty confident we had the resolve and attitude to see out the game.

That is a massive plus and shows the complete change within the club brought about by TS.

I have to say I am now back to looking forward to going to games rather than trudging to them under sufferance.

As an aside it was nice to see Wellens give credit to us for a deserved win which makes a change for an opposing Coach.

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:26 am  

Best performance I've seen us do for a few years saints didn't have much answer

Mcintosh looks like he's hitting some form brilliant last night looked a threat most times he had the ball

Would give savelio another year but only a year to keep him on his toes

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:26 am  

It hammer's home how important it is to have the right coach.
I don't know how much TS is on, but definitely much better value for money.

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:30 am  

Smith is showing his man management skills with players like Savelio and McIntosh.

I've read players from his Leeds and Warrington teams saying how good he is at this. He takes time to get to know players individually and personally, what makes them tick, their plans outside of RL etc.

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:36 am  

Thetalentboy wrote:

Best performance I've seen us do for a few years saints didn't have much answer

Mcintosh looks like he's hitting some form brilliant last night looked a threat most times he had the ball

Would give savelio another year but only a year to keep him on his toes

Dodd and Lomax miles better than Clifford too eh?

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:42 am  

If I was being really cynical I would say Jack Smith doesn’t like Kendall and was trying to embarrass him by showing him what happens when you let both teams have a fair crack of the whip. And generally I think Smith is pretty inconsistent. Brilliant performance from Hull.

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:52 am  

Only caught the last 15 minutes or so of the game last night but great result and well played (that Litten try defo should've stood IMO and was a great finish). Always nice to see one of the "big boys" get a spanking and whilst you expect it won't derail their season is there a genuine chance Saints might miss out on the 6?

On recent form do you reckon you can squeeze into the mix?

Who do you reckon will be the 2 to miss out from the current top 8? (I've left Leeds out as playing poop even though they're 2 points behind you).

Re: On to Saints in the League : Fri Jun 23, 2023 9:58 am  

I think we will just miss out on the play offs, but at the start of the season I didn't expect us to make them anyway. As we keep saying, this is a transition year. Huge changes behind the scenes, new coaching staff, new training facilities. We've had players leave already (Evans), players announce they are leaving (Dwyer, Swift and Satae) and players we thought would be leaving, playing well enough to potentially get new deals (Taylor, Houghton, Griffin and Andre).

Next year I would expect us to be a different proposition, but for the remainder of this year, it will be good to get some more youngsters blooded, maybe move Clifford to marquee and buy some extended commitment from him to stay for a couple more years, and hoepfully the announcement of a couple of big forwards and a new hooker for next year