IanMac

I wondered whether he might have done something in his knee, his legs seemed to get twisted under him as he got tackled. Hopefully won’t be out too long. At least we have cover, Dec or Marcus could fill in at loose forward. I hope Matty Henson’s ankle isn’t too bad although he was good enough on one leg for 20 minutes yesterday.

A big shout out to young Ethan Bickerdike on his first professional game, thought he handled himself really well and tackled anything that moved. Both him and Calvin defended really well.

Get in!! Excellent boys. A really good start to the season with a lot of improvement to come. Every player gave his all there with Henson and Barnes outstanding. Hope Hanley Dawson hasn’t got too bad an injury, he didn’t appear to come back on.

Impressed with that. Yes a couple of errors but the organisation in defence and willingness to move the ball was great. All the debutants have really stood up and are looking good, thought Lightowler in the first 20 was excellent and Marty Henson looks like he’s been there a long time and Bickerdike is playing really well. There big guys are making yards but we haven’t taken a backward step. More off the same 2nd half. UTT

At last a game to look forward to. Will certainly be a hard game as will most games given the quality of players some teams have signed. I listened to Paul Crarey talking after their friendly against them, he said he thought Barrow were a big team but Hunslet were massive. It will depend how we cope with their size probably. A real shame that Marcus and Perry, 2 of our real hard hitters, are missing but hopefully we can give a good account of ourselves. Given that it’s really Chris’s first full year of a 4 year deal, I’m just looking for improvement week on week and we’ll be somewhere near at

Great to see 6 locals signing on. As Chris said they are all at different stages of their careers but he is looking forward to working with them. Good luck to them all, well done for giving the pro game a shot, I hope they have successful careers.

Yes it is. Already purchased mine, looking forward to it.

A cracking interview with Chris Thorman on the above podcast with Dave Parkinson. Although the reception on Chris’s phone wasn’t brilliant at times it’s a great listen.

Yes very true, too many to recall really but when they had the blue band in the 70’s I can remember Ian Wright gracefully striding through defences. Hopefully many memories to be created over the next few years.

A brilliant shirt. The iconic town blue band brings back many memories. Excellent, well done.

Signed a new 2 year contract in October.

Agree David. It was interesting listening to Ollie when a town forward ran in on his own and Ollie said that’s not how we’ve trained, we should be going in as 2’s and 3’s to give options. Hopefully we’ll see that start to develop.

Yea I agree with that. We certainly look to have some pace in the backs again and with Gabe Fell looking good at full back should see some nice rugby. We don’t have the size in the forwards but they are all mobile and certainly handled the bigger Barrow forwards most of the time although Ben Harrison’s off loading was excellent. Looking forward to see how we develop over the season. UTT

A good hit out for the squad. Thought they all acquitted themselves well, including the trialists who got quite a lot of game time, and certainly plenty of promise for the season. Interesting to hear Ollie say they are not expecting too much this year but are looking to build through Chris’s 4 years. Pretty good production through our league as well, good to be able to watch them. UTT

We started really well but errors, penalties and some seriously dubious decisions have put us on the back foot. Look good when we are moving it wide and for the first 40 minutes in over 12 months can’t complain really. Get Ollie on sky, love his comments!