This is spot on in my view. Said the very same to a mate last
night. The expectation on/of DM is already building to be unfair. He is crucial
to our team but he was only 3rd (at best) in command
last year. At least 2 others need to start showing up in that regard to replace
his role and the other place in the leadership triumvirate.

What is clear to me is that Burrow isn't one of them and the
2 young halves tonight weren't at the races tonight unfortunately. Think
Sutcliffe had a real nightmare to be fair.

We looked shattered after about 10minutes maximum. The
pack is way off the pace at the moment although it was
clear they were all trying. Too many stupid decisions to offload
and too many penalties or errors. Fatigue won't have
helped. We did well to still be in it at half time on the scoreboard
but the writing was already on the wall.
Achurch did ok.
Singleton needs to stop trying to smash everyone into next week and
just concentrate in making the hit first time.
Someone needs to show Garbutt how to play the ball.
Kicking game was shocking.
Good to see falloon - think he'll be good for us.
Great to have JJB back - hopefully he'll be the pack leader for us.

Woops, someone missed the joke.

I was directly referring to Kurt Gidley, who was slated by many a Leeds fan when we announced the signing for being all those things you just said.

Sadly for them, and you, he's looking like a class act at the minute and is in terrific knick for an "overaged" Aussie.

Too right. However, sun is shining, had a nice breakfast and off to walk the dog. Being generous, perhaps losing kirks tall is a big factor. Being optimistic, perhaps this is all a cunning master plan to peak at end of year. Watching n q Cowboys on telly , they are struggling. We must have worn them out, lol

Great signing for you and maybe, just maybe could take you to that elusive championship if you can get past Wigan. You should have too much for the rest.

Im sick of people blaming the injuries or lack of experience in the halves or whatever.
The fact is that the team is DRASTICALLY under performing in terms of skill and effort.
The Gelling try from a tap penalty was one of the most embarrassing bits of defence I have ever seen, absolutely pathetic, they should be made to watch that on repeat for a hour as punishment.
Mac also needs to instil some pride in the shirt, we're performing the way Salford did last year and that is unacceptable.

That one was particularly bad......Clubb's nearly as bad....and as for Manfredi's first!! Ughh....so many none existent tackles on returns from pish poor kicks

You always have a different perspective on the game when you watch it in the ground, but I couldn't sense a lack of effort from any of our players. As someone posted earlier, the amount of work we had to do defensively for 40 minutes was always going to tell in the 2nd half. Our attacking threat actually looks less potent now than ever before, and I can only see the return of McGuire helping in that respect. We looked physically a lot weaker and less aggressive than Wigan, and that's not the first time this season. Only time will tell if it's a lack of quality and physical strength in individual players or whether it's structures and a lack of teamwork that's killing us. My guess is it's a bit of both.

I was at the ground and i agree that it was not lack of effort ,

it was down to a lack of ability , lack of organisation , lack of leaders , lack of speed , lack of strength and most of all lack of brains .

I thought that the bloke in the high viz top was easily the Leeds best organiser last night. He spent more time in the line than almost anyone else.

Im sick of that excuse, if we cant deal with a period of defence in round 5 how will we fare in round 30??

I assume you're referring to the first 40 minutes emptying our tank and leaving us nackered for the 2nd half ? If so, I'm not offering it up as an excuse, I'm simply stating a fact. Any team that spends such a massive amount of time defending in their own 20 will ultimately suffer later on in the game. It wasn't just a little lopsided possession and territory wise, it gave us a mountain to climb in the 2nd half. If we'd had Wigan under the pump to such an extent in that first half we would have fared hell of a lot better over the course of 80 minutes. If Friday was a boxing match, we were pummelled for the first 40 before Wigan delivered several knockdown blows in the 2nd half. It was of our own doing, indiscipline, poor handling, very poor decision making, a benign kicking game, it was only going to lead to one result. We are playing poorly as individuals and not gelling as a team, one from two is bad enough but the combination of both is why we've been so dreadful.

We did the same to Wire in our first game but they had the energy to come back and beat us

Exactly what I was going to say. Let's be honest, the Bateman, Clubb, and Gelling tries should never have happened. Horrendous defence. That needs fixing quickly. It would help if we had Moon, Ward, Ablett and Delaney, but hey we can't use injuries as an excuse! Also, the attack would improve if we didn't have two academy players in the halves, and no hooker but again we can't use McGuire and Falloon as excuses.

Gonna have to disagree about the halves, turn on premier sports right now and watch the Tigers, there two young halves were pretty poor last season, but now with more experience, they are tearing teams apart.

Me too but slightly less concerned with the prospect of a yet to be determined home/away game in the middle 8's

Interesting when Leeds were still 0-0, about 20 mins in.

would the old guard have took the 2 points in front of sticks? Probably. If they did turn it down and tapped, they definitely wouldn't have kicked on the 2nd play!

Someone needs to game manage and dictate play. Shame mcGuire hasn't been there to guide the ship. The last tackle / 4th tackle kicks still seem 'winging it' rather than happening some appointed structure.

Didn't mind them not going for 2. In the grand scheme of things it would've meant very little in terms of trying to get a result at Wigan. But in a performance littered with poor plays and bad decisions in both attack and defence, the decision to kick on the 2nd tackle (Sutcliffe was it?) was the worst of the night for me.

Field position and possession on their line, if you score a try then great but try and at least get a repeat set(s) and if they stop you short at least they'd be starting a set 2m away from their line instead of the usual 30/40m as well as taking a bit of juice out of them.

That decision was correct - if the execution had been better it would have lead to a try. What was criminal was Handley allowing Charnley out of the end zone - schoolboy error!!

TBF we are usually woefull in forcing repeat sets and scoring close in, the ammount of times we are tackled on the last on the goal line is criminal.

Im more confident in Leeds making a break from 40 yards out and scoring than 40cm's out.

fully agree. It shouldn't be that difficult to prod the ball behind the goal line now and again to force a few repeats but does seem to be a problem for us.

Indeed. Bloody awful really

I think this proves how much we rely on off the cuff stuff. I think it also shows how much influence the coach has. He obviously gives them a freedom to express themselves, but how much work do they do on the training pitch learning drill after drill, set play after set play? Sinfield's brain earned us many points over the years? How much input does Mac actually have? And is he being exposed since he lost a genius and a warrior whom the whole dressing room respected?

Yes i agree with all the off the cuff stuff but it stands to reason that repeat sets and building pressure is a sure way of getting over.Wigan do it to great effect, they didnt look like creating owt all first half but they took petrol out of our tank by camping on our line and hammering away until we had nothing left really in the second half. We don't look like we ever know what we want to do even on the last play in the opposition red zone the ball ends up with the likes of Cuthbertson or Hardaker when you would be expecting a half to be taking over.Simple stuff really that needs looking at.

Exactly this. There were a couple of times against Wigan that Hardaker was brought down on the last tackle ~20m out. It looked as though he was just waiting for something to happen in front of him, and then was caught with ball in hand. It shouldn't get to that point, as you said.

Does any team constantly work on set plays? I hope not, if they do then we're even further behind the NRL than I thought.