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Can Wire do the Cup and League Double?


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Mr P, if you're hinting the Wire Coach is the problem, we'll give him a go at the KC.

God no. Far from it.

All of the other top teams have obvious weaknesses that would be addressed were it not for the salary cap.

Leeds at prop, Wigan at half, Saints down the left, Hull at coach - I can't see where that is at Wire. I suppose that they just need to learn to win.

People called Romans they go the house

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God no. Far from it.

All of the other top teams have obvious weaknesses that would be addressed were it not for the salary cap.

Leeds at prop, Wigan at half, Saints down the left, Hull at coach - I can't see where that is at Wire. I suppose that they just need to learn to win.

Back 3 at Wire

A lot of Yorkshiremen believe that when God created the world, he made it with perfect balance.

He balanced the hot areas with the cold areas. the dry areas with the wet areas.

And, in creating Yorkshire, he created the most glorious place on earth - full of majestic beauty and sporting giants.........and for balance he created....... Lancashire.

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:lol:

PMJ - you talk of hard work in the off season - but seriously, what can Smith do? I can't see any weak link in the team (Mathers has been OK for you, but is being replaced) so strengthening may be difficult. Every other top team, I can see how they'd improve with a couple of players, but most if not all of the Wire team seem to be at the same level and you can't replace them all.

Is it a mental problem? That could be tough to sort out.

Mathers, playing as a an attacking pivot has been our undoing on a few occasions, see last night for reference. His ability to stop players grounding the ball over the line is second to none, but the way we have played with him coming into the line as an attacking half as been very hit and miss. It seems when the pressure is on to make the absolute right decision, it just doesn't happen.

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Dunno. Would the Pies bottle it like they did against Leeds. I don't normally see much SL but I saw both Saints - Wire and Wigan - Leeds last week and Richards had three chances to win the game for them and fluffed them all. Could it be that it really is a mental thing?

Actually Richards had 2 chances to draw Wigan level which he eventually did - and one chance to win the game.

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:lol:

PMJ - you talk of hard work in the off season - but seriously, what can Smith do? I can't see any weak link in the team (Mathers has been OK for you, but is being replaced) so strengthening may be difficult. Every other top team, I can see how they'd improve with a couple of players, but most if not all of the Wire team seem to be at the same level and you can't replace them all.

Is it a mental problem? That could be tough to sort out.

I'm talking about re grouping and ensuring the back to basic approach in certain sections /times of the game

Control and composure is required.

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Not sure if any one would agree with me, but the whole cup win and the subsequent homecoming and all that surrounds it doesn't seem to have helped the team. I'm not saying that the club shouldn't have had a victory parade but I just feel it's not helped the team and the fans concentrate on the important business of the play-offs. With the Cup Final coming before the play-offs it seems to be very difficult for teams to maintain the same level of consistency when they're in the inevitable after-glow of victory.

Well done to Huddersfield, let's just hope they can keep their good run going and upset the odds again next week.

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Not sure if any one would agree with me, but the whole cup win and the subsequent homecoming and all that surrounds it doesn't seem to have helped the team. I'm not saying that the club shouldn't have had a victory parade but I just feel it's not helped the team and the fans concentrate on the important business of the play-offs. With the Cup Final coming before the play-offs it seems to be very difficult for teams to maintain the same level of consistency when they're in the inevitable after-glow of victory.

Well done to Huddersfield, let's just hope they can keep their good run going and upset the odds again next week.

Wire need to find the energy to make the cup wins spur them on & the last 2 years they havent. Ok last year they probably had to poor a start to the season that when Tony Smith came in they were in too poor a position to challenge but i still feel they could & should have finished higher than 9th.

This year they let 2nd slip & lost both playoff games post CC victory.

In the past Saints have managed to do the double / treble. Wire need to progress to that.

It would be interesting to see if next year they didnt make the CC final would they do better in the play-offs?

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Wires problem is (and I hope they continue) want to play a more high risk brand of RL which becomes an even bigger gamble in the wet weather. The Roosters under Brian adopt the same philosophy but the weather is far more conducive to the style of play.

I do think the coach made a mistake re Myler. Once for the Cup Final you can understand but repeated tinkering and in addition tinkering at 9 creates instability. A couple of players are over rated and do not earn their salary. Carvell is the obvious example. However, Wire do have a better youth development programme now and one or two very good youngsters are emerging. Wire need these youngsters coming through because time is limited in terms of the experience core of players and their impact could be lost before the youngsters are blooded and brought through.

Time will tell but I hope Wire continue to follow the Smith philosophy.

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Mathers, playing as a an attacking pivot has been our undoing on a few occasions, see last night for reference. His ability to stop players grounding the ball over the line is second to none, but the way we have played with him coming into the line as an attacking half as been very hit and miss. It seems when the pressure is on to make the absolute right decision, it just doesn't happen.

Not very often I disagree with you, but tbh I think you are being very harsh on Mathers here. I think the link into the line from Mathers has been a real highlight of the season, and has created a hell of a lot of tries for our wingers. It is quite strange for him to link in on the left though, so not really sure why that happened.

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Wires problem is (and I hope they continue) want to play a more high risk brand of RL which becomes an even bigger gamble in the wet weather. The Roosters under Brian adopt the same philosophy but the weather is far more conducive to the style of play.

I do think the coach made a mistake re Myler. Once for the Cup Final you can understand but repeated tinkering and in addition tinkering at 9 creates instability. A couple of players are over rated and do not earn their salary. Carvell is the obvious example. However, Wire do have a better youth development programme now and one or two very good youngsters are emerging. Wire need these youngsters coming through because time is limited in terms of the experience core of players and their impact could be lost before the youngsters are blooded and brought through.

Time will tell but I hope Wire continue to follow the Smith philosophy.

Can't disagree with much of that.

I have also been a touch disappointed with some of Smith's tinkering at the back end, but then shouldn't coaches always be learning as well as the players? Maybe he will learn from this, or maybe he will still be happy that the right choice was made.

Personally our big issue in attack for me was Monas. His passing was back to it's worst and he broke up our momentum on numerous occasions, and this kept us under pressure in defence in that first half. The bloke is not a scrum half, was dire there in his first year, and needs to get back to 9.

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Can't disagree with much of that.

I have also been a touch disappointed with some of Smith's tinkering at the back end, but then shouldn't coaches always be learning as well as the players? Maybe he will learn from this, or maybe he will still be happy that the right choice was made.

Personally our big issue in attack for me was Monas. His passing was back to it's worst and he broke up our momentum on numerous occasions, and this kept us under pressure in defence in that first half. The bloke is not a scrum half, was dire there in his first year, and needs to get back to 9.

the cup win, fantastic and professional as it was, caused problems in subsequent games. we went from a fluent "we'll score more points than you" team to a "lets try not to lose" team. monaghan has to be at 9, which means higham or clarke have decisions to make, for me clarke should move to 2nd row.

as for the rest morley, westwood, wood, hicks, king and briers were stand outs. carvell needs to step up a bit next season, it's a surprise to see him in the england squad, i'd have picked wood before him.

still, 2 trophies in 2 years isn't that bad!

foxes or poor people?

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the cup win, fantastic and professional as it was, caused problems in subsequent games. we went from a fluent "we'll score more points than you" team to a "lets try not to lose" team. monaghan has to be at 9, which means higham or clarke have decisions to make, for me clarke should move to 2nd row.

as for the rest morley, westwood, wood, hicks, king and briers were stand outs. carvell needs to step up a bit next season, it's a surprise to see him in the england squad, i'd have picked wood before him.

still, 2 trophies in 2 years isn't that bad!

Yep to all of this.

Carvell has been outstanding in odd games for us, but odd games are not good enough at the top level. Wood has been outstanding, I agree with you.

I think one of our biggest issues is still that we either blow teams away or we lose tight games. I don't think we have mastered winning the tight games. We lost three of them to Saints, one to Wigan, one to Leeds and with more composure could have completed the comeback against Huddersfield.

Either way, we are a far better team than anything I have seen play in P&B, so I can't grumble too much.

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A key question is who is going to come in from the obviously talented juniors? It would only take 2 or 3 to make a breakthrough to supplement an already formidable squad.

I wonder about the balance in the pack - I think there are too many identikit big rough lads and not enough ball playing/agility there. Hence when a team gets its nippy steppers among the forwards they are really exposed. Obviously, they are struggling to work out a role for Myler, but to take the obvious Moran analogy further, when he was running off a Jimmy Dymock he was deadly, when he was asked to run the show he was a disaster. It won't happen, but if Wire had Cooke at 13 (and he could be persuaded to play to a plan), with Hodgson at 1 they could be unbeatable next year.

How they replace the older core of the team will be an interesting challenge, though Smith must realise Briers and Morley aren't going to be better next year than they were this year.

Plenty for Smith to cogitate on over the winter.

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Yep to all of this.

Carvell has been outstanding in odd games for us, but odd games are not good enough at the top level. Wood has been outstanding, I agree with you.

I think one of our biggest issues is still that we either blow teams away or we lose tight games. I don't think we have mastered winning the tight games. We lost three of them to Saints, one to Wigan, one to Leeds and with more composure could have completed the comeback against Huddersfield.

Either way, we are a far better team than anything I have seen play in P&B, so I can't grumble too much.

In fairness, in the tight games lost the deciding factor has been goal kicks on a couple of occasions. Hodgson will address that, hopefully.

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In fairness, in the tight games lost the deciding factor has been goal kicks on a couple of occasions. Hodgson will address that, hopefully.

ah yes, hodgson! still not convinced. riley has said several times that he prefers fb so there maybe a bit of job sharing there as smith has said he doesn't expect hodgson to play every week.

which brings me to mathers, i don't think he's been hard done by as that's the nature of sport, but he won us a cup final and hopefully the fans will remember that.

oh, and solomona. ridiculously gifted which more than makes up for his, how shall we say, relaxed approach to defence!

foxes or poor people?

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In fairness, in the tight games lost the deciding factor has been goal kicks on a couple of occasions. Hodgson will address that, hopefully.
Yep, that's a fair point, but I also think that in all of the games mentioned, with a little more composure we could have put the games to bed without worrying about goalkicking becoming an issue. That said, I am probably being harsh on them, as the three teams I mentioned are all champion teams.
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