My question to TS would be - Is the Warrington philosophy working.
Every time we are on TV the pundits applaud us for the way we play and try to balance our error / completion rate against our willingness to push passes to create opportunities.
Does it work against the big teams when they are in form?
Over the last couple of seasons has it lost us more big games than we have won against the big teams.
From 2008 to 2012 it was a bit of a shock to play against a Warrington team who threw the ball about but could also defend if they lost possession.
But can we defend against sustained pressure from a team that is prepared to play to a game plan based on building pressure and introducing fatigue into our team.
When that happens (Widnes did the same) our error rate increases as we are playing under fatigue.

It is great that we can sick 60 points on London but so can Wigan and Leeds when they choose to. But Leeds and Wigan can also play boring but effective rugby in the big games.

We didnt help ourselves from the first minute yesterday with Russell running straight into Ben Harrison and then Ratchford kicking out on the full but Leeds looked like they were not bothered about scoring for the first 20 mins. They just wanted to drain the juice from us and it worked, we could never catch up after that.

Do we persist with this way of playing, Ignoring knock ons the amount of ball we give back to the opposition by either obstruction penalties or simply passing the ball to them is frustrating, after 25 minutes you could see the enthusiasm drain from the players when we lost the ball, The high fives and 1 finger in the air had started to fade away as the thought of defending for another minute hit home.

Dont get me wrong I have enjoyed the way we play but I would prefer to play boring and beat Wigan in a final than go down having played a nice brand of rugby.

I completely agree.

There are so many differing and varying opinions on not only what the 17 should be and which position they should play, but no combination would have steered us to a win after that first half.

Possession, less so territory, is all-important in conditions like yesterday.

I fully expected Leeds to turn up with what I regard as their play-off tactics.
They try nothing, get to the sixth and, depending on where they are on the pitch, either kick high to the corner or distance.

They would be my exact same tactics if I was coaching a team against Warrington.
Play safe (even dull), get to the sixth and wait for Warrington to get impatient/commit unforced errors and capitalise on the opportunities presented.
The amount of defending we undertook in the first twenty made a victory unlikely, regardless of the score at that time.

That match was lost very, very early on.

The week before we did play safe against Catalans.

I'm not saying I prefer anything. Generally speaking it takes 3 players to get from the right 60 to the left 60. It used to be that lock provided the link in the middle with the halfbacks "split" on either side of the field. Now, the halfbacks are expected to get through a lot more work getting themselves in the right positions to work together, and the fullback acts as the final link. There would be no way to get the 13 involved as well, as it would slow the ball down. We even saw the start of that diminishing role with Sculthorpe moving to 6 to keep him involved in the play.

I've seen Graham throw a 20 yard pass, but as a skill it's a lot more common then it once was. Props are becoming less and less limited, just as big wingers are becoming more common.

Bateman looks like he can step into the OLoughlin role although Wane has generally played a 3rd prop there when Lockers is missing. Sutcliffe at Leeds looks like a natural loose forward but may finish up at stand off.

Carvell has the last laugh on Tony Smith.

Just out of interest ? Are we forgetting Simon grix.


Who would've been playing loose forward for most of this season had he not been injured

This is spot on.

We don't have the third pivot that Hodgson brought to us in Russell, but Ratchford can give us that. We were laughing after beating Leeds at home saying how great we looked with Bridge and Myler as the half back pairing with Ratchford seemingly coming in like a "Scrum Off".

I think Ratchford is ready made for the old style of loose (rather than the new 'third prop' as the position has now become). He has open field skills, he can sniff out broken play and exploit it.

Do you know what, I actually did forget about Grix when I listed my other post.

When fit, he's one of our most important and high quality players!

I'm a bit underwhelmed by Russell's contribution at FB if I'm honest, sure Hodgson's were big boots to fill but last season Ratchford seemed to have filled them.

Granted Russell is only young and still learning the game at this level and Lord knows we have been hit a miss this term all over the park, so I'm not scapegoating based on erratic form away at Widnes and the idiotic obstruction yesterday. I hope that he fulfils his obvious potential, but, he could do with something more than a busy looking running style on kick returns

I wonder whether Rhys Evans could do a job at FB? I think that Rhys's defence is good, he is safe under the high ball and I think that he might chime into the line more consistently than Russell, who doesn't seem to have that in his game ATM All in all I think he was a bit fortunate to get picked yesterday despite the fact he has 1 on his shirt.

We as a Forum at least seem to have more questions than answers I hope that the reverse is true for TS

Wasn't the half back combination v Leeds (SL)Ratchford & Bridge, not Myler.

I've REALLY wanted Russell to be a success.... But you have to be honest, he looks a bit ropey. Lets hope its just taking him time to mature into the role.

I will wait until the end of next season before judging him properly.

Waney already said Russell had problems positionally on Radio Manc prior to our mauling at home by them. He was his coach then as a junior.

Russell looks bests scooting from dummy half. playing him at wing will mean he is up with play early on so we can utilise that skill.

So many of the mistakes of early season are still there. Do the coaches do anything about it? Russell never links up and rarely passes the ball. Myler will never be a playmaker. Bridge is now increasingly getting caught with the ball. The players were so flat that we had the knock ons and forward passes.
The helter kelter style looked so amateurish against a solid but not brilliant Leeds. We no longer have Briers and Hodgson to organise the play. We were like headless chickens in the first half.

And as for Asotasi and his 25-minute contribution. is this what we brought him across the world for?

Sinfield hasn't played loose forward with any regularity since 2011, one of McDermott's first moves was to shift him to stand off, have him defend out wide rather than up the middle and drop Burrow to the bench as an impact sub.

We've had a lot of players cycle through loose since then. Brett Delaney's playing there now but Ryan Bailey got a good run there before last season.

Carl Ablett has played there but having gone very well in the centres, and having much better hands than Delaney, Mac has put him back in the second row so he can run at defences out wide (as he did very effectively at Briers in the 2012 GF).

Liam Sutcliffe looks like an old-fashioned loose, 6'3'' & 14 stone, good hands, good pace, can hit a gap as well as carry the ball like a forward. Hopefully he'll get a chance to make the position his own.

SOL was the whipping boy during Wigan's fall from grace. The fact that he is Wigan through and through and never gave up made people say some ridiculous things about him. Instead of letting his critics destroy his confidence Lockers carried on his development into a world class LF. If he is anywhere near fully fit in the play offs it will be a massive boost to Wigan.

Back on topic, Wire have a difficult transition period. Is TS the right man to see you through this? Mind you, they may have won the other day but Leeds have bigger problems IMO. The next couple of years will be hard for the Rhinos.

You can't even call it a contribution.

Watching the match back he was an absolute liability. He can't even run.

Laughable. He may be the worst signing ever at this rate.

Agreed, he is just an absolute s***house, its like he is scared of tackling or driving the ball in too hard!!

The sooner he gets his return ticket back to OZ the better.

When he was spelled he ran faster to get off than he did when in play. I am tryinghard to find a name in my memory that was as inaffective as this guy.

Dallas Mead !!

Don't you just love his 2m gain carries.

Hardaker was running at him when he was on the pitch and understandably so. He has all the dynamic movement of a wheelie bin.

he sprinted off the bloody pitch, i couldn't believe how fast he moved. BLink and you missed it.

all joking aside, i think both parties need to agree, its not worked, lets call it a day and move on.

Why would Asotasi give up 150k+ to "call it a day"?

Whilst the LF role has changed it's also worth noting that the emergence of the hooker, and the full back being used as an extra pivot there's no need to have an extra ball player at LF. Warrington are struggling because their 3 manin pivots at 6, 7 and 1 are all similar players. There isn't an organiser in the side. At times because of Warrington's off the cuff style having 3 main play makers that are runners and support players works. Against the the more organised, and quicker defences the short comings of the pivots gets exposed.