His right arm was strapped from his wrist to his shoulder.

We weren't good enough by any means and I don't want this to seem like an excuse as widnes were good for the win, but the officiating was absolutely baffling last night 18 point swing in poor decisions, knock on from ormsby, their knock on which was given as a widnes penalty just before half time and failing to check grounding on an Owen try.

I thought Atkins looked good, probably our best (aside from a knock on or 2), showed some real enthusiasm in getting fast play the balls which we didn't manage all night. It seems a lot of our game hinges on fast ptb's so we need to be far more enthusiastic to control the ruck area, that said the referee needs to realise when a defender is laying on for a few seconds after he has shouted release, he penalised it twice but it happened a lot more than that. Asotasi needs to move on at the end of the season he is finished and doesn't seem to have anything to offer to the cause.

The biggest thing for me from last night is that ratchford is wasted at centre, he needs to be on the ball more in the middle of the field. Whether that is loose forward or in the halves I really hope to see him back in the middle for the rest of our season, we missed Joel too.

From early on in the game the Wire looked very lethargic ,whether that was because they weren't used to the artificial pitch i don't know, but the first half was when Widnes did the major damage to the result . We did look a lot more mobile & quicker in the 2nd half though but there was too much game to chase by then & not helped by some baffling refereeing decisions. Also we are still affected by the "score off every play " mentality that causes panic play with more ball going to ground. Ratch is a loose forward not a half back ,full back or centre .

Ratchford is a stone to light to play loose.
although that said he could well have the makings of one.
at this moment in time the team needs him at hb with Bridge. That was when we had our best form against all odds for so long.
That has been missing since TS has tinkered with Myler and GOB there.

I said this a couple of weeks ago after the Wigan v Saints game. Still lots of work to be done.

Last night was like back to the future. Widnes wanted it more and at times we just didn't look interested. When Widnes scored before half time the players just stood watching the kick, nobody was talking or giving out the orders.

The club needs to realise the importance and history that this fixture holds and start showing it some respect.

any chance you can play that bad on 30th august please

Every chance if we get beaten by Cas the week before.

Yes, we were poor in the skill department. Yes, Bentham had an absolute 'mare. But IMHO the main reason for the defeat was that Widnes wanted it more than we did.

i agree emphatically with this post, widnes treated friday like their wembley final, for us it was a match of insignificance. the players didnt show any imagination, pushed plays by trying to offload in imposible situations and only showed any spirit when it was too late!

A result like this was almost inevitable... and more a reflection on our apathy to the league competition than anything else.

Bridge was disappointing, and doubly so that he rushed and missed the first conversion, had that gone over it would have been a massive psychological boosts.


But he rushed it. And he rushed the third one as well.