Shaul is a miss because he is an experienced player in our squad who is unavailable. Matongo would have come into contention with Ma'u and Bowden out, so is a miss. Ma'u is a 3-4 week injury based on last week's update, so 2-3 week's still. Reynolds was said to be 4-6 week's 2 weeks ago. So neither will be back according to stated timescales. As you say Bowden is likely to miss out, so that's 5-7 players missing against last year's Grand Finalists. Not negative, just factual. As you'll see from my posts after the match, I'm pretty chipper about our start to the season, but we haven't played a top side yet and now have to do so with a chunk of the squad out, possibly evem both first choice halves.Good to keep a sense of perspective I think.
Shaul being unavailable however has proved an opportunity to Connor who I feel is flourishing in that role and offers so much more in attack, so not the miss you're making it out to be in my opinion.
Ma'u and Reynolds are definite misses but again timescale not definitely known.
Matongo is a back up player at best but him missing on a positive provides an opportunity for Brown who I rate to be better.
Bowden looks to be a definite miss too so out of your 5-7 missing, I think in real terms about 3.
So keeping a good sense of perspective I prefer to look at the positives.
We've played Warrington who you keep reminding us are a top 4 team.
I suspect Wigan will be too good for us though but even they have injury problems and were playing Farrell and Isa as centres and Smithies in the back row. French has only just come back and Field is missing also. Just to put it into perspective and not making rash assumptions regarding players missing.
I'm glad you've been pretty chipper because we look a far better team under Hodgson but you still like that negative spin to downplay our chances, let's be positive eh.
I would like to go the season without us falling out
Connor has to stay Full back, playing well there, took two wrong options but at least he is trying something.
Very safe under the high ball, solid defensively and also organising the defence really well.
He really needs to step up his positional play though as Fev caught him out with kicks behind the line.
His effort or lack of for the Wakefield kick behind the line was pretty terrible, he just didn’t follow the play at all and wasn’t even in the frame when Batchelor collected the kick.
Wane has talked about the GPS stats for high intensity efforts during the game which Connor doesn’t seem to do.
Shaul being unavailable however has proved an opportunity to Connor who I feel is flourishing in that role and offers so much more in attack, so not the miss you're making it out to be in my opinion.
Ma'u and Reynolds are definite misses but again timescale not definitely known.
Matongo is a back up player at best but him missing on a positive provides an opportunity for Brown who I rate to be better.
Bowden looks to be a definite miss too so out of your 5-7 missing, I think in real terms about 3.
So keeping a good sense of perspective I prefer to look at the positives.
We've played Warrington who you keep reminding us are a top 4 team.
I suspect Wigan will be too good for us though but even they have injury problems and were playing Farrell and Isa as centres and Smithies in the back row. French has only just come back and Field is missing also. Just to put it into perspective and not making rash assumptions regarding players missing.
I'm glad you've been pretty chipper because we look a far better team under Hodgson but you still like that negative spin to downplay our chances, let's be positive eh.
I would like to go the season without us falling out
This will never happen. I'll partially concede on the Warrington point (Big 4 club for sure financially but fans baying for the coach to be binned off) but on current info we have 5 of our squad unavailable for selection next week (Reynolds, Ma'u, Bowden, Shaul and Matongo)and may end up with that number being 8 should Griffin's shoulder and Sneyd's leg prove issues and Faraimo cops a.ban. Next week is a massive test for us even at full strength and we hear nothing else about Wigan than that they never seem to weaken with players out because the next cab off the rank from the academy is of equal capability. I hope we can dig deep and find our best performance of the year so far to win because that's what it will need to be IMO. Let's return to the risk assessment after the disciplinary and squad announcements.
Didn't matter in the end but why did Thaler send this up as a No Try and why didn't the video ref overrule it?
It's very easy to say that looking at a still picture, but Thaler was on the wrong side to see the grounding and the ball came pinging out so it would have been hard to give a try on the field. Then on the replay it did look like his hand might have come off it before he regathered again. I don't really have any issue with it being disallowed.
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It's very easy to say that looking at a still picture, but Thaler was on the wrong side to see the grounding and the ball came pinging out so it would have been hard to give a try on the field. Then on the replay it did look like his hand might have come off it before he regathered again. I don't really have any issue with it being disallowed.
This will never happen. I'll partially concede on the Warrington point (Big 4 club for sure financially but fans baying for the coach to be binned off) but on current info we have 5 of our squad unavailable for selection next week (Reynolds, Ma'u, Bowden, Shaul and Matongo)and may end up with that number being 8 should Griffin's shoulder and Sneyd's leg prove issues and Faraimo cops a.ban. Next week is a massive test for us even at full strength and we hear nothing else about Wigan than that they never seem to weaken with players out because the next cab off the rank from the academy is of equal capability. I hope we can dig deep and find our best performance of the year so far to win because that's what it will need to be IMO. Let's return to the risk assessment after the disciplinary and squad announcements.
I'd be very surprised if Faraimo escapes a ban, and it looks like we will be without Bowden for a couple of weeks at least. Sneyd certainly seems to have a knock but it appears to be manageable. He still did most of the kicking last night which suggests he wasn't struggling too badly. No idea about Griffin.
I'd be very surprised if Faraimo escapes a ban, and it looks like we will be without Bowden for a couple of weeks at least. Sneyd certainly seems to have a knock but it appears to be manageable. He still did most of the kicking last night which suggests he wasn't struggling too badly. No idea about Griffin.
Hopefully Reynolds is only a week or two away.
Reynolds is running now.i guess the club are trying to get him fit for the C/C game Cant see us getting a win next week but hopefully if we have Reynolds back for the C/C we can put in a performance and get the win