flow wrote:HuddsTigers wrote:Losing Zak makes no difference to our ability to defend.
We have gone from having a right edge of Minikin, Webster, Roberts and McMeeken to Minikin, Foster, Rankin and Holmes.
A Minikin who is a shadow of the 2017 player, his confidence looks shot. Foster who isn’t a centre, Rankin who is half decent but not as defensively solid as Roberts and Holmes who doesn’t look fit and isn’t a right edge player.
A full back can only do so much - it’s the 12 in front that are the problem. Even the best full back in the world wouldn’t have altered that last night.
hudds you some times post rubbish saying zak made no difference we have still not recovered from losing him really made that much difference to back line in attack and defence, was like an extra centre in attack and organised the line for defence. Plus we were getting a lot bigger attendances to watch exciting rugby we played like saints are playing now. And to say rankin is half decent oh dear boy what games you being watching giants must be very happy with swap . Why you a defending clare is not up to standard Bradford and York champ teams dint want him . Your right about minikin gone backwards foster never be a centre like .
Absolutely spot on flow, especially the extra man, he had it off to a tee after only a few weeks and that was a massive concern for me having had it in Dorn. Dorn was tremendous attacking, but look how poor defensively he was -Zak highlighted that change even more and scored worldies too.
Your point about us playing in 2017 like Saints do now is again absolutely bang on!
At the end of 2017 I did say i had a little fear we’d make the same mistakes as in 1994;95 & 1999/00 seasons when we were just a couple of high quality players away from greatness. Because of the current set up in the board room and coaching staff I genuinely thought that we’d push on.
I even suggested selling mcmeeken or Holmes, or Roberts, or picking someone who may well be at their maximum value, if it meant clearing that extra space and bringing monies in for fees and salary cap. I was thinking outside of the box about how we may well be able to take the extra steps needed. We effectively cocked it up tbf and even Daryl takes an element of learning experiences from that.
We’re still thereabouts. This isn’t likelt to be our year, but who knows! On our day we can beat anyone including saints if we have a worldy.
I think we’re in a position throughout the year to really concentrate on 2020. If I was Daryl Jon the board, I’d seriously be going all out to leave no stone unturned in every aspect of being able to reach the level of the wire and saints. Jon wells in particular is the man I’ll be seeing what he does over the next few months up until the start of next season in particular.
I just feel we’re at a crossroads right now. I so want us to push on again. It’s never the finished article, but we can and will get to the standards we all crave if we stay together, stay calm but make tough decisions.
In terms of Rankin, there’s definitely a player in there, but sadly his defence is worse than Ellis’. I lose a lot of respect for a player who doesn’t seem to want to learn how to tackle properly - it’s not hard to learn how to tackle properly, it really isn’t.