redjonn

Just watched a few of the videos above and I thoroughly enjoyed them. What I particularly liked was the calm relaxed and I guess quietly confident manner of presentation. A thoughtful discussion or Q&A rather than some journalistic focus of need for an headline.

true... and on that point as you say they have finished in the right position. Never-the-less you have finished mid point in the table or one can argue the bottom six and get to be in the play-offs. I'd prefer top 4 or even top 3... then at least your in the top 25% or third of the table. Just that the win/loss is such a way from the top teams. Personally to answer your 2nd point I would have a system that you have to meet a certain win/loss ratio somewhere above 60% or higher and then adjust the fixture to suit the number of teams. Maybe that's too complicated.

a fair point if that was the case but one would hope that after the 2nd dummy half run the defensive line is broken and with retreating defenders so that the attacking team can then exploit with some attacking plays... I did say hopefully but it probably still finish with a high kick to the corner, that is the safe or cautious or risk free option because you either get a try or end set in the corner,

Hard to predict... Leeds will struggle with regard to the forwards, given injury and bans plus tiredness - may well be similar with regard tiredness for Hull, I wouldn't know. Can Leeds be nimble and agile enough to work around Hull pack and to spread the ball and tire the Hull pack and from their take the game. Plus can Prior and co give less penalties to not make it easier for Hull - I doubt it. Whomever wins neither team deserve to be in the play-offs... but either could do and who knows could end up in the final. Hopefully not as it would make even more nonsense of the system for them making play-offs with such poor win/loss rate around mid 55%.

none... but then again what proportion of SL coaches given the team and squad he inherited would have achieved similar. No doubt he is a excellent coach but surely you have to compare apples with apples.

Hobsons Choice... (early 50's) black and white film with Charles Laughton at his best, and John Mills & Brenda de Banzie in the lead roles. . A romantic period comedy film set in a boot makers around 1890.... in Salford. Its a great film classic with the father thinking he rules the roost but its really his 3 daughters that have the power and his eldest whom really controls and manipulates the family.

You do what any successful CEO would do... create the right organisation with the right type of people with the expertise... within the bounds of your available funding. e,g, if the broadcast, media industry and corporate sponsorship arena is changing and you are reliant on the funding and awareness from those area's you need an organisation fit for that arena. or in simple terms a good marketing organisation with the appropriate parts... Not easy to build but RL has never had a good CEO... good lead administrators yes... The problem may now be we haven't the monies to invest when maybe previously we did... as it helps generate more monies that otherwise if we had it now.

Don't think many would disagree with trying to make the game safer. Its not just the high tackles... yep we can police them down towards zero but its still going have brain issues from the high impact tackles and heads rocking/whip leash type. That's the thing the game has to try and grapple with - not sure its possible without slowing the game to a crawl and hence lessen impact or go touch only.

not sure how we make RL more compelling to watch, as in more exciting style of play. I note some good idea's above but at its heart RL nowadays is a very structured game. Every team has set plays from all parts of the pitch with associated targets of where to finish sets/plays. Occasionally the play may be off the cuff, maybe due to a marker not being set say, but then reverts back to type - but even then their will be a team plan/structure approach to whenever say Clarke darts off from PTB. If you consistently watch your regular team you can see the general play plans being followed through. I guess some enjoy that chess board play enacting out, but most of us can't read what's going on so easily and hence yarn for more than what they are watching. I guess what we want is for less chance for teams to be able to follow their set plays. That is have a more unstructured game. I guess that can only come if possession is much more contested and hence disrupted.

Leeds have been very consistent with the ill discipline last couple of seasons but especially this year.... They don't seem able to fix it and its a major problem.

agree to some extent. Particular the warp speed, I personally don't like the need to be trying to speed the game up. On TV we do have the half time and end time summary, although on sky the adverts do prevent time spent on this. I see the idea of helping the TV audience but just think have to be careful not to impact the stadium audience. In addition I think the BBC get it right with regard to summarising incidents and what's happening type of education for floating viewers. Just that Sky are very poor in comparison.

just on this paragraph. maybe for TV audience but I'm attending a game at a stadium... how's that going to help. What it says to me is TV is the priority, and maybe it is over fans attending but somehow that doesn't bode well for the game.

yep, started with hookers waving their arms at every tackle/PTB... took a while to be followed by other players but they certainly eventually followed appealing at all and sundry. Lesson - don't let the problem take hold like with the hookers... penalising them when it started would have stopped what we have now.

well hopefully it is also reported to the police as assault and not just dealt as a RL discipline issue.

Only allow people in that smiled. Ban any excessive moaning Minnie's from forums... At least the one man and his dog left will have beaming smile... that'all do lad/lassie

chuckle... no it was a very old black and white but the one you have just posted was very similar. Wonder what got into their heads - seemed like a duel, I can do better than you... particular amusing was the players all standing and surrounding watching as he readied for one of the kicks.

yep, still haven't got all services back yet... I guess you where impacted too. Watched lots of repeats programmes on netflix and iplayer, which we enjoyed watching again. Only thing we really miss is Talking Pictures TV... all the old black and white films, not so much for the films but the street scenes... thinking about that sentence Its not surprising we watch RL as an alternative.

we seem to balme all and sundry on the game today. I can name the 1960's Liverpool team, I can name the 1966 world cup team... I can not name the Liverpool team of today or recent decades except for some players, I can not even name all the England team that just played in the euro finals. It ain't the standard of rugby that's doing that... and just as a bye line we lost our TV transmitter in our area for last couple of weeks which meant I watched Youtube RL quite a few times... some of the games highlights were poor. particularly the ease to avoid the poor tackling. One of the very early games had lots of kicking, every time someone caught the ball they kicked it back - yep it was RL We need to be more objective when watching some of the earlier games of RL.

maybe but surely SL and the RFL should be talking to them about the Sky product/ presentation. I don't think the NFL would put up with something poor... unless of course SL thinks its ok.

Whilst their are issues to be addressed for the sport I do think the performances on the field are impacted by the ridiculous fixture pileup. The number of games played in short number of weeks is causing players to be missing through injury and those able to play you can see are more tired than normal. Its been like an elongated Easter fixture congestion. It os no surprise than the standard on the park looks even worse than normal, especially as teams are playing lots of youngsters. Great for their development not so good for the overall standard of play. Surely it also impacts attendance too, not just the resulted overall standard of play but also the hands in pockets to pay or the mid week or early week days games are played.

you got it right.... I got it wrong.

now your bringing into play the complexities for those of us whom only watch the ball...

still think he is good for Leeds at centre... even if not ideal covering for Gale which he has done recently,,, better than Leeming covering. I think his passing is fine, he was or has been instructed to run more with the ball when covering for half back but he occasionally over did it.

yep... probably came when Sutcliffe covered... chuckle. although to be frank I don't know but yep Handley was top try scorer

yep McLelland played well and his confidence grew as he was increasingly taking the lead and directing play.