[url=http://saints.rlfans.com/node/23Article up now[/url

If I don't perform at work I expect a certain amount of criticism from the people who pay my wages depending on my performance.

Just as I expect the praise.

The level of expectation has risen as my performance over the years has improved and people pay me more.

But

There's a world of difference between being criticized in the moment and consistent criticism.

Being criticized in the moment no matter how nonconstructive reminds me that I need to up my game.

It was perfectly acceptable for the people who pay their wages to boo them at half time, in fact after 10 mins. It was a shocking first half.

Consistent criticism however is destructive. A minority of fans feel the need to pick, pick , pick to the point where they are rarely satisfied and will find fault in great performance.

This team gets fantastic support from its fans and will continue to do so but there is nothing wrong with expecting a level of performance from the current team.

As a point, we don't pay their wages on account of there aren't enough of us to make Saints a profitable business, thus allowing the club to use our money to fund the wages of the players.

Ski, I'm not trying to be funny mate, but you might get someone else to give your articles a quick proof-read before you post them!

I probably could.

I could also do with more sleep enabling a focused mind, but insomnia seems to put paid to that!

Ski, I think you need to get off your high horse. All this moralising from some quarters is both dull and a tad nauseating.

Should the performance of our particular well paid group of professional sportsmen take an upward swing this season then I can guarantee they will be cheered and clapped and praised all the way. In the meantime, while they are playing rugby that would shame London Skolars (bless em, I hope they win again soon), they deserve to know that their fans are not happy, expect better of a bunch of internationals and if for some people that means booing then so be it. I found it quite funny, actually, even though I didn't boo myself. I just didn't clap. They didn't deserve to be clapped even though they did marginally better in the second half. (Sheesh, how my expectations have dropped)

to be fair, as fans we put in around 4.5 million into the club every year, so we put in well enough to pay every employee at the club, twice over.

I've got a feeling the booing at halftime will be a lot worse in 2010.

Actually, I don't think it will. We were not expecting us to slide so rapidly downhill this season. Next season most if not all fans are expecting us to be nothing like we have been, simply because Long and others will have gone.

Maybe most saints fans won't expect us to do well next year but if we are still playing this mistake ridden boring rugby they will boo.

It's not always the losing that makes fans boo but it's sometimes the way they lose and why they have started to lose.

True indeed, we lost to Bradford at home but had an awesome purple patch that entertained us all. It isn't the losing that caused the booing, it was that we were playing a severely weakened team and played bloody awful. The tries we conceded were poor and came from mistakes and not reaching touch with a penalty is unforgivable.

We don't look anything like the team that beat Leeds twice in the 1st half of the season and it is the woeful drop in form that is the worry. It really isn't the losing as Pete says. We look less than ordinary right now. Let's see what Harry can conjure up! Boom,boom.

There is [inever[/i justification for booing a team if you are a supporter of that team.

Are you so stupid that you think that the players don't realise that they aren't performing to their potential? Do you think that the coaching staff are so incompetent that you don't think they know that something is amiss? Do you not think both coaching staff and players aren't working as hard as they can to rectify the situation?

Sport is very much a confidence game, even the best players in the world can look like some of the worst when their confidence is low. They start second guessing things that at one time were second nature, and when that happens usually they usually don't come off.

All booing does is further erode already low and fragile confidence. It doesn't help anybody, and makes us sound pathetic as a group of supporter.

Fans rip into other fans when we hear them boo another team, you see posters on other forums saying " haha your fans suck, booing just becasue your down a few points at half time, you losers"... aye were in a slump and not cutting through and scoring 40+ points at home each and every week like we used to do year in year out, but BOO'ing.. ah hell you booers, feck off to the Haliwell Jones Stadium were its expected to happen and encouraged by the CEO.

OR were the boo's for the ref? Some people I spoke to in the pub afterward saind the boo's were for the ref not the team. I disagree, they were defo for the team.

Yep, was interested to read this article and thread, as the stick we (Wire fans) got for booing our team was laughable, especially when it is now happening for you when you are sitting at the top of the league.

The booing at Wire was as a result of consistent failure, and was a response to get a change at the top, it worked. I certainly didn't boo, and I don't believe in it, but the Wire booing is completely different to a few spoilt brats at Saints booing because their team aren't smashing their opponents for a change.

Hear hear. The people justifying it are embarrassing.

Put a bit of European football on the TV and if the home side isn't winning at half time, it's mandatory for the whole crowd to boo the team off and not once do the players go all fuzzy round the edges, cry because no-one loves them and never have a good game ever again.

We're just too soft, us British.



There is no justification for booing a bad performance but there are times (and I'm not saying Friday was one of them), if the team is clearly not bothered, if they are taking the p[ii[/iss out of the fans, that displeasure needs to be shown or they will think they can get away with it every week.

If they want to lap up the adulation when they play well, they have to be man enough to take the criticism on the chin when it is merited.

Why is it that shouting derogatory comments at players is deemed au fait whereas booing is not? Why is it coaches can hurl tea cups at players but the fans are not allowed to show any dissatisfaction whatsoever?

If we were allowed to throw tea cups at players then I am all for that, at times this past month or so I would happily throw a few tea cups. If you can clarify that me doing so would result in no action being taken by teh police or me losing my right to enter a rugby ground again, then pass me the cup, and leave the tea in it to pal.

Is coffee a more serious offence? surely herbal tea cant hurt anyone?

Dunno, but someone throw a cup of something at leon and get him woken up please.

Triple expresso?

Sounds a good start.. its Espresso by the way

Posh B**tard!

I have to say that first 10 minutes deserved to be booed, it was the worst opening 10 minutes I've ever seen from Saints.

I'm sure we'd all rather forget but in that period they committed the following cardinal sins (among others);
Let the KO bounce allowing the opposition to get possession
Failed to do anything on the last tackle twice
Didn't get the ball into touch from a penalty
Didn't mark up properly at a play the ball under the posts

Now I accept that we are out of form and so that will mean our attacking moves might not come off and we'll look disjointed, but these are absolute basics that just require individual concentration and effort. If they'd happened in the last 10 minutes we'd be hacked off so to play that way in the 1st ten tells me there's something wrong.

Hopefully a week off will help