The Phantom Horseman

Yes I had the year wrong, it was 2018 not 2019 that Luke went on loan to Leeds from us.

Yes, seems very unlikely. Butterworth & Tennison also in their squad but whether they play remains to be seen looking at who else they have included.

It's hard to know what Fordy will do with Wacokecoke now. By no means all of the tries leaked down our right side have been his fault, but he did seem to have a couple of howlers in him most games and his decision making was once again poor in the Bradford game. He undoubtedly has some talent but I'm not sure we can keep playing him and hoping his defence and decision making improves. But I guess if there is a game to play him in Whitehaven might be the one. I'm assuming Hull KR won't want to reward Broadbent for signing what is effectively a 4-year deal by asking him to play in the Championship at Whitehaven a few days later. There are now seven players realistically fighting for five back 5 spots at Hull KR but I doubt they'd want the likes of Gildart or Opacic dropping down to the Championship. I'm not sure why Gorman wouldn't be considered a candidate for us again? He's not the biggest but has been pretty solid I reckon and his speed helped create a try against Bradford, and if he played it would mean we wouldn't need to asky Addy to kick goals as well as play 80 minutes. For me Wynne did enough against Widnes to keep the starting right wing slot and I think when he's fit again Josh might find himself back in the centre as he's our most reliable defender there.

I took the view that a few words in Fordy's quote when he left were quite telling..."He’s been a real favourite on and off field. Unfortunately, after picking up a knee injury, he’s not quite nailed his rehab."

So we're five games into the Championship season, some eyecatching scores at the weekend and perhaps a picture starting to emerge. Wakefield are perhaps about what was expected - they are steamrollering most teams like we did last year, which is what you'd expect given their reported spend is close to £1.5 million, but they don't look anywhere near as good at this stage as the 2022 Leigh team. To be honest they're almost an irrelevance to the Championship this year - they'll walk the league leadership title, may or may not win the Grand Final (they probably will but as we well know, one-off play-off games at the end of the year can be unpredictable), but either way, they'll be back in SL next year. Bradford were just staking a claim to be in pole position for second spot when they did the most Bradford thing and lost to an 0-4 team in York. I think that showed again that 2 or 3 tough, close games in a row against strong opposition can have a knock-on effect - just as we played poorly against Bradford having been in 3 brutal games with Wakefield (twice) and Leigh, Bradford had a number of very tough games, especially the last two, and presumably that told at York (not taking anything away from York who yet again have had a long injury list). Sheffield have made an impressive start to the season and will probably rack up another big score against Barrow this week, we'll know a lot more about just how good they are when they face Wakefield the week after. Halifax have a lot of injuries to key players but losing 46-0 at home is still an eyepopping scoreline. Hard to see them being a top 6 team this year unless there's a huge turnaround. Widnes competed very well against us and their improvement looks genuine at this stage. Interesting to see if they can maintain that form as they have tended to drop away after a prominsing start in previous years. Toulouse have taken a while to find their form as they sometimes do and clearly aren't the force of 2019 or 2021 but I think they'll still be a top 6 team and probably top 4 as the season progresses. With some teams (us, Halifax, Toulouse, maybe York and Batley to an extent) not looking as strong as in previous years, it's certainly a harder league to predict from week to week than in previous years, barring Wakefield.

I don't know if this is a different situation or if the rules have changed, but when Luke Briscoe went on loan to Leeds from us in 2019, we were able to recall him on DR terms. https://www.featherstonerovers.co.uk/news/rhinos-loan-briscoe-oEC7a/ As for the reason for the loan, could be any number of reasons, but maybe related to salary cap? Jordan Abdull is also officially on loan from HKR to Catalans this year but I don't think anyone is expecting him to return to HKR.

One area of difficulty at the moment is the rotation of our middles. I think there have been at least 4 games already this season where one of them has gone off at a fairly early stage with an injury and hasn't been able to return which has meant others picking up the slack. As a knock-on effect, we are now seeing multiple players in that position returning from injury and perhaps lacking a little in game fitness; I thought that for a period in the second half against Widnes we looked like we were struggling for energy defensively in the middle of the park. Another knock-on effect is that Addy has been asked to do huge minutes nearly every week, and at times he has understandably looked to struggle with his workload. He's 33 years old and if he keeps playing 80 minutes he's going to be mentally and physically shot by the second half of the season. To me Tanner looked in need of more minutes on Sunday which was understandable, Bussey is still working his way back, and Massey will be in the same boat. I'm still not sure what our best pack line-up is and I doubt Fordy is either, We're still finding out about Tanner and we haven't seen much of Massey either. With Kamano continuing to look solid, there's probably not much between quite a few of them behind Gadwin (when he's fit).

If they had the opportunity to sign him now (and before the May 1 deadline) why would they not do so given he's out of contract at the end of this season, rather than wait and potentially get involved in a bidding war with other SL clubs?

They want him as a long-term, versatile option for their backs. I'm sure that he'll play plenty of games for them but it might depend on injuries and suspension. With Hiku, Evalds, Burgess, Opacic, Gildart and Hall all fighting for a place in positions 1 to 5, he's not going to be guaranteed a starting place.

"Featherstone Rovers can confirm that they have today concluded a trade with Castleford which sees Corey Hall move to the Tigers and Jack Broadbent to Featherstone". Seriously though, it will be interesting to see if Broadbent is made available on DR (assuming he doesn't get into the HKR squad), otherwise looks like another chance for Gorman.

For me, there are 3 contributory factors to our poor defensive record on our right edge this year, it's not just 1 thing... 1) on occasions our centres and wings have made poor reads and jammed in opening up gaps. That's what happened with the 1st Widnes try, Hall made a poor read coming in to help Bowes with his man and leaving a huge gap for the centre, aided by a great pass from Gilmore. 2) We have got the numbers wrong/not shifted across fast enough on plenty of occasions leaving the centre/winger with little chance. 3) We have played a number of teams whose best half back in terms of creating shape/organising passing moves plays on their left hand side, so against our right. In those terms (ie creating openings and exploiting defensive weakness), Gale is better than Lino, Lilley is better than Davies, and Gilmore is better than Lyons and they all play on the left. No coincidence that I think Wakefield, Bradford and Widnes have all scored a lot more down their left side against other teams as well as us.

My original post edited due to incorrect info! I agree with both comments above, he's very good.

Some eyecatching scores around the league today.Wheels seem to have totally come off at Fax whilst Sheffield continue to fly high, and a good win for York, every time Bradford seem to be showing signs of improvement they revert to type. Doncaster must have put in a massively-improved performance from last week judged on the scoreline at Barrow, sounds like Batley had a proper dig for the first half at least against Wakefield. Exciting game at Fev with both teams mounting stirring fightbacks. Big score for Swinton too.

Gorman, Fishwick and Wallace are all playing for Hull KR reserves today, which would seem to back up the suggestion that they would have been available to us but weren't selected this week.

I agree with all the above but for me the Halifax fella is just a fan with a mike like a lot of club commentators and he doesn't have any agenda, he just got exasperated watching his team getting heavily beaten and reacted like a lot of fans on the terraces would, it was quite amusing to listen to as a neutral but I think most of us can probably relate to how he would have been feeling. Gledhill's a different kettle of fish, he tries to pretend he's a journalist as well as a club commentator but is so obviously biased it's painful, to be fair most reasonable Bradford fans seem to find him a bit embarrassing too.