Sheffield reaction

[town4me]

Awful first half cost us the game. Poor in every department. Kicking tackling disapline and completion. 2nd half not much better.

[DavidM]

Yeh it's a tough one . We never lack effort but that team obviously isn't good enough , and yet again to many basic errors and penalties in the first half killed us off . Second half , yet again we see that with these halves we can't control the game when we have all the elements in our favour . We never seem able to play territory ?

Doran was especially poor , and they never put a stamp on games . Perry for me was a stand out , Rooney and OLSTRUM had a dig , VERLINDEN to . Gordon looked knackered virtually from when he came on ! Tough when you're already second best when. you shoot yourselves in the foot ,and we badly need our guys back or it's a struggle . Endeavour yes , but quality and nous to compete lacking .

One last thing - the number of tries we concede from short range , being shoved over with sheer strength or dummy half runs . Far far to many . Rarely do we concede from distance ... Often from close range.

[town4me]

Our small squad simply can't cope with 7 first choice players missing.

[Derwent]

I expected us to lose by 12-16 points, which would have been acceptable, but not by 30. We make far too many unforced errors with the ball and concede too many penalties without it. Our goal line defence is poor at times, conceding soft tries from close range barge overs seems to be a regular thing with us.

But, at least we know that eventually we have the personnel to come in and improve us which in other years we haven't had, so no need to panic just yet.

[townie88]

I thought we matched them for the first 20 minutes. Then penalties cost us deeply 1st half. Refaree was truly shocking with alot of his decisions and missed so so many forward passes.

Whiteley was by far our best today. Credit must go to him. Olstrum also decent. Apart from that, not much.

At the end of the day they were a full time team and expect to be battling the bulls/leigh etc at the top end. They spend more time together in one day than towm do all week so not alot can be expected.

With everyone available, id like to think we would get within 10-16 points. Nothing lost and nothing gained. Hopefully now injuries.

What was PVs view?

[Ginock1]

100% agree Derwent, marker defence is poor and has been for a while. Positives are mattys back, whiteley bar not passing on the 2 on 1 was excellent and verlinden going to do great. Referee was poor for us , some strange calls.

[wonky]

Positives are whiteley (apart from not giving that ball to dec) was outstanding and when our 2nd rowers return he needs a shot at centre, verlinden looks the part, thought olly had a good dig (didnt look unfit to me), matty getting minutes. Thats about it tbh, tee deserves a go in this side at full back, jack offers us nothing at all, the backs didnt get the ball. We needs our stars back asap, dewsbury struggled with swinton so theres nothing to fear there, with brett,shacks and hopefully sammut returning then we have a chance.

[Pink panther]

To be fair they were never 30pts better than us. 3 trys they got is where we should have got a penalty then in next set they got a easy penalty. Big verlinden done well as did olly Gordon doran tried and played well as did forber matty looks a bit of the pace but that will come in due time. I would like to see brett or sam switch with jack. Jack always looks under pressure. Up the town on to next week

[DavidM]

Matty tested his shoulder and that was a big positive ... Was it him put on report ? Referees are what they are at this level , seem to blow one way , often bizarre calls and zero help from the fantastic physical specimens who run the line . I thought Sheffield had a really good side on paper, and where big , strong , run hard and did things seconds faster . They'll be there or thereabouts

[dkw]

3 trys to acting half runs on our line are unforgivable, so frustrating. Perry was superb, our best forward. 2 debutants went well, verlinden especially. Made great yards after the tackle and got his arm free a lot, we should make good use of that. Murphy brings nothing to the side now, bar his backing up for the try he had zero influence. Ref was shocking, but no surprise. Let stringer away with all kinds, seemed desperate to give them a pen or let them play on anytime they lost the ball.

[DavidM]

I thought Keith Senior was superb for them . Played a blinder

[Keith T]

I have to agree with PV in that Town were very disappointing and if we have been doing work on our defence then we need to double it this week because some of our players today were only half-hearted in making some tackles.   Today showed how much we miss the other 7 who were out of commission.    We can make as many excuses as we want but the bottom line is on today's performance some of these players are not up to the task.   Sheffield looked good in parts but no way were they 30 points better than us and we gifted them a couple of tries plus one gifted by the referee right on our try-line.    He just seemed to be playing to two different sets of rules at times.

 

Whilst Whiteley was good going forward there was still one or two very weak tackles from him and he blew 6 points with his brain fart when we had a 3 to 1 advantage and then they went up the other end and scored - a 12 point difference in a couple of minutes.   I thought Olstrum was out top worker today and Rhino put in a good shift for a newcomer as did Gordon.    We lacked guidance at half-back and I was shouting most of the game for Forber to have a go and try and make a break instead of just passing or kicking and the first time he did this we scored through Murphy.  

 

I didn't hear what the crowd was today but once again if we want to build attendances up we have to do a lot better than we did today.

[town4me]

I thought we matched them for the first 20 minutes. Then penalties cost us deeply 1st half. Refaree was truly shocking with alot of his decisions and missed so so many forward passes.

Whiteley was by far our best today. Credit must go to him. Olstrum also decent. Apart from that, not much.

At the end of the day they were a full time team and expect to be battling the bulls/leigh etc at the top end. They spend more time together in one day than towm do all week so not alot can be expected.

With everyone available, id like to think we would get within 10-16 points. Nothing lost and nothing gained. Hopefully now injuries.

What was PVs view?

good honest intrewiew with PV. Not good enough, some players didn't hold their hand up. Making no excuses about missing players and dissapointed they ran through us in the middle which he said they had expected and worked on through the week. Said they had 3 more sets than us in first half and 6 more sets in the second half so we never got equal share of the ball.

[DavidM]

Are we big enough and strong enough ? Some of our forwards aren't troubling these sides , and the nature of the tries is worrying . Big strong lads at this level and you need to match up physically . Size was something else that is injured as well as quality . Get well soon is all we can say . Defence at and around the ruck , and on the goal line needs work . No effort at all to barge over , and we saw it last year as well , Dion Ayre for one

[Guest]

I couldn’t have been more wrong about just about everything. Amazed how good the pitch was. It wasn't a forward battle at all as Sheffield were like a team of backs and half-backs just so much quicker at everything they did and seemed fitter.  We stuck in best we could and had a few moments but result was never in doubt. Disappointed at so many tries from dummy half and so many tries on the back of soft,odd or suckered penalties, Back to reality I guess.

[DavidM]

And Batley beat Leigh , with Swinton edged late by Dewsbury . It's only getting tougher to compete

[shaun mc]

Attendance 813

[DavidM]

That 13 made a fair bit of noise

[Guest]

Batley beat Leigh!! Indeed clearly bar raised somewhat ....

[town4me]

Best team won and all that but did anyone else notice the ridiculous amount of forward passes the eagles made today? It was comical. Even the short passes from the PTB seem delayed so when the pass was made it was forward.

[Keith T]

Did Sheffield have 14 men on the field just before half-time and I don't mean Keith Senior?     Doran was making a kick from hands and he was tackled late and high by the Sheffield number 9 who then got up and ran right off the field in to the dug-out.   I never saw another player come on and counted their players and there was 13 on the field!!!!

[wonky]

Are we big enough and strong enough ? Some of our forwards aren't troubling these sides , and the nature of the tries is worrying . Big strong lads at this level and you need to match up physically . Size was something else that is injured as well as quality . Get well soon is all we can say . Defence at and around the ruck , and on the goal line needs work . No effort at all to barge over , and we saw it last year as well , Dion Ayre for one

with a pack of shacks,matty,walker,stack,brett,szostak and backed up with ryan,olly,olstrum and callum then thats a completely different proposition. When verlinden wasnt on the field we definately lacked go forward, the other lads are all good tryers and put a stint in defence but i cant see scholey,mcavoy and rooney bursting tackles are carrying players down field.

[Monkeydo]

When you have a c*** for a coach (aston) and dirty c*** leaders on the field (Knowles, stringer) what more can you expect? The League standards may be improving but the officiating? lololol

[Hate the rec]

Didn't expect us to win today, thought the lads tried hard, but there speed at PLB killed us, they kept it tight at the ruck area and played it fast with sort passing (some forward) but it worked and had us on the back foot.

Perry looked good, should of passed to Dec for a walk in, then ref piggy backs them back and they score !!!

Rhino looked promising and everyone seemed pleased with his performance I have spoken to.

With the players we have to come back I am confident we will do ok.

Onwards and upwards.

ps nice to see Cottercash supporting Town today, surprised he wasn't at Fax, I hope things are ok  

[ivans82]

i thought sheffield looked what they are , a very well coached full time team . they attacked down the middle off short passes from dummy half , with a very flat line but all moving forward .they were very professional at all the little tricks such as ball stealing and penalty milking .i doubt we will see two bigger centres and wingers all season .dec and sam had no chance with their oppo s , just far too big and strong . having said all that sheffield with all there "flat" passing could fall foul of a better referee . he was worth about 18 points to them i guess .as for town i think there is definite promise there and against lesser teams we will be o.k. don t forget we have a lot of players on the sidelines .thought sams cross field chase and tackle was the games highlight for me (even though they scored a couple of plays later ).pleased to see perry raise his game and our imports look as though they will be a handful.. not too downhearted , with several of or top players missing you need the bounce of the ball and a fair ref to stand a chance , and we had neither.anyway onwards and upwards .UP THE TOWN .