Crown Flatter

WR, I hope I’m wrong, but Crusaders have developed and progressed through the season; have we?

I reckon we are in for a torrid time at Colwyn Bay, be it the weather or from the league leaders. Their points difference alone stands out against our paltry 38, theirs being 233. North Wales Crusaders 52-10 Dewsbury FTS: Jordan MoM: Craig McShane Att: 401 I doubt we will even win the penalty count.

Super idea, go our own way, get the television companies in to offer a deal. Which television companies would be interested though?

When will we manage to play for a full 80 minutes? I don’t think we woke up until they had scored their points. We are still trying to barge through defences, but all to no avail. When Keighley did the same they were able to break through and get passes away and tries were scored. Only Craig McShane managed to score in that first period to Keighley’s three converted tries and a penalty goal. We managed to get close to their try line four or five times without success until McShane’s touchdown, sadly not converted. Playing downhill in the second half should have brought success; we got close at 20-16, but instead of having the impetus to go and score more, we seemed to lose concentration and drifted into losing our heads and finished seeing Coates taking a break for ten minutes, which ironically, brought out some great defensive work, surviving three penalties on our line and once knocking the ball down from their passing movement. Hookem’s try was for once, from keeping the ball alive on the last tackle with some good passing and running. The best try of the match came from Caelum Jordan, who outpaced everyone to run some 80 metres to score in the rich corner. That try was immaculately converted by Jacob Hookem, but from that point we dropped off and did nothing else on attack. Late in the game there was a chance; we got the ball on our 20 and if someone had had the nous to kick over the Cougars’ heads because there was no full back and chase, we may gone in for a possible winning try. Hookem had gone off the field by then for a head injury assessment. Have we no other kicker in the side? Our indiscipline showed today with penalty count of 11-5 against us.

I would like to think that the lads will go all out for a win on Sunday, as a tribute to Elsie. Keighley 18-26 Dewsbury FTS: Dec Tomlinson MoM: Keenen Tomlinson Att: 1338

Sad, sad news. I first recall her when on the supporters’ bus to Whitehaven in the ‘’60s, sat in her usual seat-at the front. I think she told me her Dad was a Batley supporter and one Saturday she asked him to take her along, but Batley being away from home, he took her to Crown Flatt and from that match on she became the Dewsbury supporter we have all come to know. It goes without saying that she will be very much missed and so will her chant of “Man wi’ t’ball Dews” and many others too.

I tune in when I’m away and plan to do so again this year, although I wish away games were also featured.

I think for around 60 minutes our play was worse than that against Goole and considered we were lucky to be behind by only 14-4 at half time, even though we had a couple touchdowns refused because we knocked on. We are probably top of the league for knocking on, although there was none of the dropping the high ball just little ones in the tackle and we are past masters of conceding around half time. In the second half we managed to grab a try about twenty minutes in and that seemed to embolden the team and our bigger forwards barged (as last week) against theirs, wore them down and we started to throw some passes out wide enabling Jordan to score two tries. 22-14 up and ‘Haven appeared to get second wind and pressed our line a time or two, but too many errors by them and our defence scuppered their chances. I think if they had scored, to make it 22-20, things might have been different. Instead we capitalised on their errors and Coates sent in Garside to rub salt into ‘Haven’s wounds. I don’t know why Coates passed to his captain as he could easily have scored himself, not that I am complaining. Some supporters questioned the officials’ abilities and there were errors, one such was an offside which went unpunished when a Dewsbury player tried an unnecessary grubber, which rebounded off an opponent and picked up by his teammate who was in front of him. It’s a pity we left it so late to open up as I’m sure we could have gone on to increase our score, but time was up. We still lost the penalty count, which I made around 4-9.

No place for Delaney in today’s line-up with Keenen taking his place and Dan Coates returns at S/O.

I see that Louie Walker is included in the squad and if he plays, Hookem could revert to his old position if necessary. This fixture could prove difficult for us if we don’t show a vast improvement from last week and I suspect that we will fall short come the final whistle. Dewsbury 16-25 Whitehaven FTS: Copland MoM: Craig McShane Att: 643

You have to smile.

We should be, but after last Friday’s débâcle, I’m not so sure.

Attendance at the match was 4,182. Is the the Giants’ largest attendance this season?

I was so disappointed after the game thot I immediately departed for home, not even acknowledging the players, let alone going to the Royal Suite; nor did I look at this forum until now. There’s little I can add: far too many dropped balls; when in possession it’s five barges and a kick; we pass to a standing player who is then immediately clattered by an opponent; even now when defending, we still dance with the ball carrier instead of going for the legs (I know, I keep going in about it). It was poor stuff and the coach has to take some blame, poor player selection and lack of tactics will not help us reach the top four at the regular season’s end. I made it 5-3 in our favour for the penalty count.

Silly of me I know, but I am confident of victory on Friday. Obviously I have no idea of the squad at the time of posting this, so it’s just a guess as to who might play and score. Dewsbury 36-18 Goole FTS: Senior MoM: Jordan Att: 553

Career ending injury for me.

What was wrong with Billy Pickup? I tried showing my wife his side-step and promptly slipped off the kerb, twisting my ankle!

Yei! I’m hoping he’s another Aizooo!

Near enough; he will be 44 in August.

I think I may have come close my attendance prediction, but nothing. I am very pleased to be proved wrong! I thought it was a well managed victory. Conceding only three penalties (one for offside and two (I think) head high) is brilliant as far as I’m concerned. We scored three well worked tries from Gill on six minutes and Keenen Tomlinson, two. The first of those I thought he wasn’t going to stop running, such was the speed he had. Hookem’s conversion look to be going well wide, but the goal kicker judged the wind beautifully. Sykes’ kicking and his powerful tackling was lively to see; his experience probably helped the team no end. Daft as it may seem I thought Town moved the ball better and made more ground in their sets. but made more mistakes. Wear scored a really good try from an off-the-cuff kick and chase, but that was their best. Penalty count: 3-3. Referee was good, but one Worky fan considered he missed a lot of forward passes and offside by us! The weather was mostly bright, but with a tricky wind. No rain, except on the journey to Workington Great day out.

I could say either of them, but will go for Craig.

I go with low expectations rather than much hope. After all we haven’t played for a month and from what some people reckon, we have done little training, Not being match fit doesn’t help either. It is likely we will make crucial mistakes, then resort to non-rugby tactics and our indiscipline will lead to countless penalties for the home side to use to its advantage. Worky on the other hand, sit second after winning games. Currently, we sit only five points off the top of the table, but crucially, only five points from being in the bottom three! Workington 26-12 Dewsbury FTS: Hookem MoM: McShane Att: 682

My prediction: Rochdale Hornets 20-24 Midlands Hurricanes Keighley Cougars 18-30 Workington Town Whitehaven 30-16 Goole Vikings

I’m predicting : Oldham 18-12 Toulouse Olympique Batley Bulldogs 12-30 Bradford Bulls Halifax Panthers 30-18 Doncaster London Broncos 10-24 Sheffield Eagles Widnes Vikings 22-12 Featherstone Rovers York Knights 36-8 Hunslet

My error on the ‘Haven sin binning, for which I apologise. As for the incident, I think the commentators were surprised that Bickerdike received a yellow card. I also must correct the penalty count, we ‘won’ six, not three as I suggested. As the LE report was compiled by Jordan Weir, it will have been correct and he was the BBC Radio Cumbria commentator, along with former Whitehaven favourite, David Seeds. Whilst their commentary was a little biased to the home side, I was more than happy to have full commentary, not something Radio Leeds often supplies for teams in the division in which we currently find ourselves.