Sainthamish

Rochdale have pretty much pressed the self destruct button this season. Based on current performances Rochdale will struggle to get above the bottom 4 of league 1 next year. With the Sky contract due up at the end of 2021 and rumours that the funding for league 1 will go then it is a worrying time for Rochdale. Hopefully, the club have a plan!

Looking at the team listed in the League Express I can only see 3 lads from last years team still playing in this team. Shame as the core of that team were pretty decent. They just missed a quality centre to replace trigger when he went to Batley and a old head in the halves to lead the team around. Instead, almost the whole team has been replaced and then replaced again half way through the season.

About 25 mins into the first half, while at 0-4, Danny Richardson sparked into life for Leigh and caused us all sorts of trouble. I know that Lewis Hatton was subbed off at 25 min with Jamie Acton coming on but, I don't know what changes Leigh made around that point but, it certainly worked in Leigh's favour.

It is only mandatory for the home team doctor to be at PT championship games. So doubt that the Swinton doc was there.

I think that's the point. There wasn't a facility to enable that to happen at Sheffield given that the lad was on a stretcher. Barring loading him onto the team bus.

I think it would have been the Sheffield club doctor and I presume he was still strapped to a stretcher.

I heard that the ambulance didn't turn up and they gave up waiting after 4 hours and carried him onto the coach. If they'd have stuck with waiting for the ambulance it could have been way longer. I've read that ambulances are often stuck queued up outside A&E because there are no beds for the patients they're carrying. If this was the case then I can totally understand why they didn't go to the hospital in Sheffield. I was also told that there was only basic pain relief at the ground that did little to address his pain. Didn't even have gas and air. It's right that Will should be angry and should be highlighting this. Imagine the anger from saints fans if say, James Roby had the same injury at an away match at Leeds and was still on a stretcher waiting to go to the hospital, with basic pain relief, hours after everyone has left the game and gone home. Or the same situation for any superleague player. Why should player welfare be a lower priority in the Championship?

I appreciate the importance to the club and it's fans of getting back to Sheffield. But, I think they should have stuck with playing at Wakefield until OLP was up to scratch. The OLP experience reminds me of when my son played at under 12's and I think it may have been at Shevington where they played on a school field and went back to the local pub for after match butties. Not really the set up you'd expect in the Championship. To be honest, the set up at most amateur grounds is better than at Sheffield in my opinion.

Just to pick up on the points regarding players wages for fringe players. There's some inflated figures knocking about in the comments (£15k). These young players at the lower end of the first team squad could be earning as little as £5k to £6k. It's an issue because a significant percentage of lads turn down the opportunity to be a professional player and get a job instead because the rugby money is so low.

It was also great to see that the bulk of award winners were 21 or younger. Hope we’re looking to keep these lads at the club as they’ll get better with age. Although, I guess that ship has sailed with regards Deon and his move to Barrow. It’s a shame as I recon he’s really improved throughout the season since joining as an amateur to plug the gap left by Trigger.

We played well up the hill in the first half but, shot ourselves in the foot in the second half with the number of errors we made. When we could complete a set, we were making huge yards down the hill that showed with the 2 comeback tries.

Just announced that Danny Yates has signed for Batley and I noticed that Deon Cross has signed for Barrow. With the rumours of there being a few off to Crusaders, will we have anyone left from this team next year anyway?

The thing that killed us yesterday was our lack of possession. We either gave away penalties, knocked on, or was just desperately unlucky. All that effort in defence just burnt us out. We're also lacking some forwards. I guess George King wasn't available, Dave Allen is injured, Gaz Mid is injured, Gavin Bennion got called back to Salford, Matty Hadden going back to Ireland and Toby Adamson was injured. I'm sure that all these lads would have made a difference if they were either fit or still with the club. I'm sure just having one extra forward on the bench coming on with fresh legs would have helped (we only had 2 to rotate). Having said that, our effort in defence was outstanding. No one can say that the lads who played yesterday weren't trying.

What a great performance by the lads. I think the real difference between ourselves and the likes of Leigh isn't so much the gulf in talent but, certainly the gulf in money. Especially, the fact that the money is there for Leigh to keep a full time team. If our lads were able to train full time I recon we would be a hell of lot closer to the top of the championship with the same team.

It was a great win and personally I thought we well deserved that win. We were the better team overall I thought, certainly in defense. Even at the start, our defense was superb keeping them in their 40m only for them to get them 40/20s.....twice!! I bet Killer was pulling his hair out at that point ?