Tonight was an absolutely perfect microcosm of the season we've had. Good players struggling to cope with what appeared to be an inferior side. The home games this season have varied between dour and depressing with only the occasional spike into comfortable viewing. I hate to pan Potter again but a DA side would have put that lot away early tonight and not made it such an unbelievably difficult struggle.

I don't know what has caused it but our form this season started off well and has nose dived dramatically. If that's part of us adapting to Potter's regime fine, if it's a sign of his influence we've made a horrible choice. People say he was brought in to mould a squad like he did with Catalans. But we aren't developing the squad at all, one player is all we are signing for next season. So what can he mould? It's not like he is going to drop the few senior players we have for the kids is it. Surely we would have been better served going for a coach with a proven track record for getting the best out of limited resources? Someone who realises our weaknesses and adapts the game to suit that.

The loss of Cayless and Fa'asavalu has hurt us but to blame those two losses for the recent form is too easy. Tonight we had enough in the forwards and made good yards but there was absolutely no fluency in the attack at all, we've got no set moves like we used to have and the players seem like they met five minutes before taking the field. I watched a few of the home games from last season on the PC this week and it's like watching a different sport. The difference between this season and last is massive.

Another thing worrying me is that we have let Longy go to free his spot up for Kyle Eastmond. If this season is anything to go by we're going to spend 60% of the season with no scrum half and no goal kicker.

I just hope the week off makes a difference as we are going to limp out of the play offs without a fight if we continue in the form we have had recently.

Long was your best and most influential player tonight and that must be a major concern.

Only if we can't find a replacement.

A lot of people have thrown in their lot with Eastmond. I've been more cautious about him. I'd like to see more of Ellis, for example, another of our potential scrum halves. He's only had two matches this season and both of them have been losses, unfortunately for him!

I thought that is what all good coaches did? It's definitely what DA did.

I dunno, a lot of good coaches never have to suffer the problem.

DA was very lucky that the squad he had was large( in depth), experienced and had plenty of cover in pretty much all conditions. Even DA would have struggled with the resources Potter has had to work with this year. He was a great coach but lets not turn him into a spectral messiah as many have with Jamie Lyon!



A sane person can see that this is largely down to the fact that we have not had for the most part of the season, the same starting 13 players week in week out. Granted a professional sports team "should" be able to cope with this but when you are loosing players on a weekly basis, especially key players like Long, Cunningham, Gidley, Roby et al and replacing them with inexperienced youngsters often playing out of their regular positions, any team will suffer.

Us adapting to Potters regime will have minimal effect when compared to the above, and what's more any changes he has intended to make to the way the team functions will in itself be greatly effected by the above!



You forget that Potter's Catalan team, like Rome, was not built in a day. His first year in Superleague Les Cats were very much a team full of Aussie imports, with barely a handful of emerging French players.

He turned that rag-tag bunch of mercenaries and inexperienced-at-top-level Frenchies into Challenge Cup finalists and strong play-off contenders. He brought on players like Thomas Bosc and turned them into class players, but he didn't do it all in the first 6 months at the club, he was given time and support by his superiors, players and the Catalans supporters and gained their respect of the back of that. We should be affording him the same, but instead many of our fans (greedy for instant, continued, success) expect miracles. Even Jesus had bread [uand[/u fish to start work with.

His moulding will be off the young players emerging this season and next, and likely the year after that. He has said on record a number of times that he wasn't expecting as many of them to have played as many games as they have this year.



You're quite right, anyone that would claim as much would be pretty naive, but it is the loss of these from the pack - experience and size wise - alongside others that play a huge part in our loss of form.

I've tried to explain on here before that it isn't just the loss of these players' 'go forward' (meters gained) and the subsequent platform that they would create for the backs that we suffer from in their absence. The loss of these players from the pack means the backs are having to do more of the hard legwork meaning fatigue kicks in sooner and they are less able to make or support breaks in attack or chase back and cover in defence.



See above. And fwiw I thought i saw us playing some new plays/moves tonight, especially 2nd half. Though it may have just been the new vantage point I watched from this evening.



Again see the differences in the squad, and the consistency of the line-ups. Also take into account the rule/rule interpretation changes.



Which is why we are so lucky in having a dearth in young half-back prospects at the club as well as one out on loan, and one former half back returning in Scott Moore (albeit in a different position).

I also find it amusing that so many have been praying for Longy's return and bemoaning our letting him go, when so many were criticising him and his kicking ability and welcoming the clubs decision to release him, prior to his spell on the sidelines.



Hopefully, barring any further injuries, we should be looking to have a full squad to choose from by play-off time. It would be great if we could get Cayless and Fas' back for the final two games to get them back to some semblance of match-fitness before then.

Exciting isn't it.

Due to injuries we've had no fluency in attack at all. Pryce has had 3 different half backs in the last 3 weeks. Hopefully now Long, KC and Pryce will stay fit and we can build around them again. Whether we have enough time to turn around our form is another question.

The two main problems have been injuries to key players and a failure to adapt to a slower PTB.

If we can get players fit, and work on improving our attack for when the game slows down then we have a good chance.

I think you are being incredibly unfair to our fans here. We have enjoyed years of success; the Dragons had not. They were being built up, we are effectively being dismantled. They had raw talent to hone, we have (had?!) honed professionals who appear to have gone to pieces. The scenarios could not be more different. Watching a 'rag tag bunch of mercenaries' being formed into a well coordinated set of players making progress and earning plaudits is totally different to watching those same players coming apart. I believe their present coach has not had an easy ride and that is precisely because they have kown a measure of success but for most of this season have been performing poorly. No fans enjoy or want to see their team go backwards. Ours has gone backwards this season and we have all had to adjust our hopes and expectations accordingly. In addition, we have had to experience the sheer disappointment of seeing a team who could produce some exquisite rugby league metamorphose into a team that Chris Irving in his Times piece (accurately) described as 'comatose'.

I get tired of holy joes lecturing to fans about how spoiled we are and blah, blah. We all love the Saints and have supported them for varying amounts of time with varying degrees of loyalty. We are entitled to feel deep disappointment and sadness at the way our team has turned out this year, especially given the great success and wonderful play we have witnessed from them in extremely recent times.

LOL

Week off

Long back

Title to focus on

You'll step up in thge playoffs.

Reflection of the top 2 so far this season

1st - Leeds Rhinos
2nd - St Helens

And i think you completely missed the point i was making. A large part of the reason Potter was brought in was to help in the rebuild that would [uinevitably[/u be needed, the club recognised that our 'honed professionals' were becoming past their peak and hired him to help with honing the raw talent that our youngster undoubtably possess. That's what i was getting at with the point you quote.

It is not Potter's fault that "we are effectively being dismantled", this was always going to happen when players like Long, Cunningham, Gilmour, Wellens etc reach this stage in their careers and we as a club don't have the funds to replace them all with similarly (expensive) experienced players.

As both I and others have pointed out this season, Mick coming into the club is part of a longer term strategy by the board/AM than this one season, a plan that we are in a lucky position to be able to 'gamble' on given our achieving a franchise place which guarantees us a place in Superleague for 3 years. They have looked at the bigger picture and have taken the impetus to increase the amount of homegrown talent in the squad prior to the rules being put into place regarding this. Yes the youngsters have been called upon more than anticipated due to injuries but it is surely better that they are playing some part this year than getting thrown straight into the deepend next season once Long, Gilmour, Cayless and maybe Cunningham et al are no longer with us.



Quite right, no fans would enjoy this, but the (small) step backward we have taken this year is down to a variety of factors and the blame cannot be solely placed on MP as many are attempting to do at this time.



Fair enough but us 'holy joes' are tired of reading the ill thought out reactions to us finally seeing something happen that many of us have seen coming for some time. The fact is we have been spoilt, the amount of success we've had since SuperLeague's inception and the way we have often gone about achieving said success has seemingly gone to alot of people's heads (i'm not targeting you personally here btw). There are a number who sadly do not recognise that success is finite, and the 'holy joes' you refer to are those sensible enough to recognise that this year is potentially the end of an era in one respect but more importantly the start of hopefully another era in which a new breed of Saints can achieve success, but this will take time.

No-one is trying to deny anyone's right to be disappointed that we aren't performing to the same standards to which we have become accustomed. It is more that we were hoping that our fans could learn from the bad examples set by many of our 'friends' over the lump (since their golden era ended) and show a little more decorum and pride in our achievements rather than spitting the dummy, and sticking out of preverbial bottom lips when we face a potential barren period for the sake of rebuilding.

Firstly, I'm well aware of why Potter was brought in. It's on record on these boards that I fully support the integration of our young players and that the need is there for us to do so. Likewise, I don't think there is a single Saints fan who doesn't appreciate the fact that our squad needs new recruits: ageing is a fact of life and everyone can see our squad is ageing and something has to be done about it. (Although, of course, not all of our 'honed professionals' are past their peak yet they are still not performing)


I wasn't blaming our dismantling on Potter.


It looks extremely likely that we are not going to win any silverware at all this season. That is not a 'small' step backward. Short of ending up where Bradford is, that's as different as it gets to the last three years. So people are bound to react somewhat to that likelihood. I am not saying it is solely Potter's fault, although nor am I saying he has nothing to do with it. People who blame Potter are looking for an answer to their question of why we are failing so miserably this season and the fact that a new coach has come into place is at best coincidental. But the buck does stop with the coach, that's part of the job, and Potter has to take some degree of responsibility as his decisions are bound to have affected us to one degree or another. However, while I don't tend to hit out at the coach (or the ref) myself (although I am prepared to criticise where I believe it is relevant), I can appreciate why others do - it is their emotions talking - and why they need to do so in order to deal with the somewhat dramatic change in our play this season.


This is what makes a holy joe. It's bible bashing. Repeating over and over the same mantra: we've been spoiled, x number of fans are stupid while the holy joes are sensible, etc, etc. This is what I was objecting to when I responded to your post. I was not arguing with the accuracy of your assessment but the fact that there are holy joes who want to keep on repeating the same stuff over and over, effectively bashing other people over the head with it, when Saints are their team too and they are simply honestly and/or less articulately expressing what they feel. Supporting a team is about feelings as well as reason. I am quite sure every fan knew this was coming but that doesn't stop the disappointment and in some cases disbelief of those same fans. Reacting emotionally is sometimes all that people have to express their disappointment and frustration, whether or not the event was avoidable (and this season, I think it was, regardless of injuries and illness because we have had a consistent core of experienced players on that field even though on most occasions it was hard to believe).


But you (inclusive) are not the teachers of other fans. Is it your (inclusive) place to hope that fans could learn from Wigan? Is that not patronising?

Yes, it is our place to hoe we learn from those sulking gits. If Saints fans were ever tarnished with the brush as that lot (we are getting there with every passing match), it would be a sad day for a once very proud set of fans.

And I don't care if common flipping sense is patronising. We can't help the fact the majority of our fan base appear to be morons.

I think come the play offs you will be as dangerous as ever!!

if I'm being honest I think we will struggle no matter who we play in the playoffs.

Getting a home tie won't help either as we seem to be worse at home. Maybe it's pressure to do well in front of home fans.

I'm going for a cricket score when we play Leeds.

Look, I wasn't making a personal retort, just stimulating debate. As such I wasn't suggesting you personally weren't aware, nor that you do not support or acknowledge the need for the integration of the youngsters. Similarly i don't believe our fans are unaware to the fact that our squad is aging and in some cases need replacing, I do however think that some fail to take this into consideration at times especially when criticising Potter's appointment.



Again I never claimed you personally did, just generalising.



It's not a huge step backward either though if you really look at it, a MASSIVE step back would be ending up where Bradford is but even that didn't happen over the course of one season. I risk repeating another mantra here again but we are still in the race to finish top, we were a win away from the cup final, and we have guaranteed our place in the lottery that is the playoffs i'd say that's not a huge step especially considering how inconsistent and problematic our season has been.



I agree. Sadly people do tend to look for one answer when in truth there isn't one single reason but many contributing factors.



Its not about (us) teaching - we're not that pretentious


Maybe it does come across as patronising but what is more patronising hoping that fans can learn from Wigan's mistakes or that those same fans have belittled the Wigan fans for doing the same things they are now doing?

We've gone in to the play offs for the last 4 seasons as winners yet only won one GF agains an overachieving Hull FC (sorry Airlie Birds). This year, with decreasing expectation and no CC to tire us out, we may win it! And the future looks good - although Potter may not handle the egos of the seasoned professionals, he does well to bring on youth.

Getting to the final with two home wins from second is our best hope. But can you honestly see us beating Leeds or Huddersfield at OT?

I think we could beat giants in GF but I'd say it would be cricket score if us and Leeds meet at OT

Yes, I could see Saints winning which is a climb down from the past few years when I've expected to win (it was the rain last year, honest). We'll get tonked at Headingley in a fortnight but will pick up momentum from beating Catalans. That's the plan.