Our current second rows are too similar in style for my liking, I would really like one of them to be in the Waterhouse style.
Has Riley Dean made an impact at whichever teams he has been at this year? Or is it a classic case of the longer you’re out of the public eye the better player you become to disgruntled supporters?
As regards Hayes not playing on Saturday I suspect the game plan was damage limitation and there was no need to put him in the firing line.
I am suspicious of the suggestion that GC “bottled “ it by not picking him, he knows him far better than anyone on here. Just like everyone on here I hope he is the future half back star we all crave as Drinkwater has proved a massive disappointment (euphemism for stunk the place out more than a month old mackerel)..

I understand that Nicholson is young, but the point is that the job on the middle is to make tackles and make meters. There’s no evidence to suggest he can do half of that job. I’m sure he can, and I’m sure on junior grades he has, but if we’re saying that of the two, Currie is the lesser player then that is simply not true. It’s that internal bias owing to expectations and salary.

The point about second rows being extra props was debated last year when Currie was the target again. But we don’t play that style, like it or not. Currie has always done the same, yet rather than replacing him in the mass exodus, we sign a carbon copy for the other side. The club want width from the back row, with leg speed and a bit of ball handling. Which is all well and good when your back three and pack make the meters to get you in position, but they’re not. Games like Saturday show that we’re easily strangled and restricted for meters and momentum, which takes out the ability to go wide. And we don’t have enough in the middle to do anything about it.

I made a point on the other thread that the 6 again rule killed us when we were getting on top. Whenever we look like getting some momentum’s for example Dufty making a few meters on kick return and looking like a quick play the ball to release Ashton to scoot. They would use that rule and completely kill the momentum, let the line get set and strangle us.

So how do you counter that, well you could start your set further up field, meaning the we catch the kick on the full. But that needs kick pressure. To get in a position to pressure the kicker you need to be winning the ruck on the late set tackles. If you wrestle and try and win one against the run of momentum, you risk giving away a late set penalty which is an absolute no-no, so you need to win the early set tackles and squeeze them. But, we don’t. We seen on Saturday Welsby step between Williams and Crowther on kick return. Crowther and Bullock gave away offside penalties on their line. Bullock gives away the penalty on the kick off return… it’s us, our lack of discipline and resilience. We’re the first to crack under the pressure that we’re trying to create. Could be fitness, more likely to be preparedness. How much game like training are we doing under extreme fatigue where these things are tested and practiced. Not enough, evidently.

So we’re not good enough in those arm wrestle elements to play with the width that we want to play. We’ve bought Vaughan, Mikaele (twice), Dudson, Bullock, McGuire, Magoulias, Crowther, Harrison, Kasiano to add to Philbin to try and fix that middle problem. And it’s worse now than when we signed those 9 players. They can’t all be bad players, they’re just under prepared and not fit/motivated enough.

Interesting as the stats are its one game, we need to look at them as a whole for the season or the back end when we weren't winning to give any weight to the 'Ben Bashers' or 'Currie Clappers" debate.

Season stats show neither being excellent. Nicholson averages 1/2m more than Currie per carry and has a 6% missed tackle count, Currie has 7%. Both have scored 6 tries (Nicholson has played 10 games fewer), Nicholson has made more tackle busts but made the same amount of errors in fewer games.

If you're going off the stats alone then Nicholson has had the better season.

i dont know if i've mentioned it on here, i've deffo had this conversation on match days that nicholson whilst an encouraging young player, doesnt do an awful lot, and he does get a pass as he's young and came in as a coup from wigan.

chambers himself said in the guardian a few weeks back we needed more from our 2nd rowers.

i've lost track of who said what on this last page, saints have built their forward pack over the last 4 years on bulky back rowers, you see the size of sironen as a second row? very little finesse.

someone just said well thats not the way we play, we dont have a style of play whatsoever, for all of powell's alleged free flowing out wide attack we were winning games when the props were scoring under the sticks this year, under chambers we had a few bright patches, the cas game where we ripped them apart through the middle, we haven't done that in any other game, or attempted to even

What's the tackle stats for both?

Tackles
Currie - 704
Nicholson - 502

Missed Tackles
Currie - 49
Nicholson - 31

Tackles per game (to account for Nicholson playing 10 less games)
Currie - 27.08
Nicholson - 31.38

Missed Tackles per game (to account for Nicholson playing 10 less games)
Currie - 1.88
Nicholson - 1.94

I always find these interesting and would like to ask the coaching staff, mainly about the hit ups. Dudson got pilloried on these earlier this year.

Sita used to as well but you do need to accept sometimes people roles in the team, eg sita wasn't a high volume player he was to come on and create impact with big drives, you're not getting 20 carries out of him but hopefully in his short period on the field he takes enough gas out the tank of the opposition forwards it helps the others?


Are their players that are tackling forwards rather than attacking forwards? Yes there are.

Jason Clark for example, regularly made sod all metres for us, as an undersized forward of that time. However to my knowledge, in Australia he spent most of his career doing tackling and grunt work so the burgess brothers et al could hit it up strongly.

Are Nicholsona stats due to him not getting involved? Or is it tactics from the coaching staff?

In our biggest game of the year where you'd want all hands on deck, it certainly stands out

Without commenting on the players performance I think we can all agree that whatever we were doing did not work and has not worked for a long time.

Mine wasn’t meant a shot at Nicholson. He’s actually a good athlete and I would have him in my squad, just not at the expense of Currie.

The system we’re trying to play of blowing them away down the middle and using pace on the edges is failing. We have (had) pace in all of the key positions. Clark, Williams, Dufty, Ashton and Thewlis are quick. The second rows are faster than the centres, but the centre void is being addressed. The failure is, in my opinion, our 6’4” 110kg prop isn’t hitting as hard as their 6’4” 110kg prop.

Nothing to do with skill. Just about whether they want to, whether they’re fit enough to and whether they are being put in difficult positions to do so by not being as smart at the opposition (i.e. the 6 again).

nope, i get it, you just reminded me, i was critical of longstaff, because what i try to base my assessment of academy kids coming in, what do they have that makes them stand out? longstaff had tenacity, but he was undersized, didn't tackle that hard, didn't hit it up hard, didn't offload.

What do they do, or can they potentially do better than the person they're replacing, nicholson is falling a little into that category for me, after a first season.

him being moved to 13 is interesting, one would expect him to play completely differently next season

His immediate predecessors at right second row were Holmes and Hughes. He contributes far more than those two.

very very low bar

But surely an improvement.

Would you like James Harrison at right second row?

I’m glad I’m not alone.
I’m a big fan of Currie.
He’s been trying to play above his weight. The like of Currie and Peanut trying to take up the mantle and make up for the deficiency in the front row.
The fatigue finding them out with mistakes.

to be fair the first choice starting props were missing.. and the others are mediocre at best.

As for the Nicholson/Currie thing.... i think we have all seen the best Currie has to offer... Nicholson could improve massively in the right team... its a long term thing really.

unless I've been watching a different game,Curries meters have come out wide.... not trying to make up for the deficiency in the front row.

And as for Peanuts meters I don't have the stats but not many of them were towards the opposition's line

its almost as if... duckies post...makes no sense....

But can anyone else replicate the “Peanut Skip”, was worth signing him just to see how it bamboozled the opposition*

*said no one, ever

Maybe Peanut was just too brittle at this stage of his career?

We never really got to see Peanut butter the opposition.

If only Ratchford had the nickname “Jelly” I believe they are a highly rated combination

And so a very long day comes to an end…

That’s my point though, we’ve signed 9 props in 2 years, and retained Philbin. That was because the middle was our weakness. But we’ve actually gone backwards. Missing Vaughan is huge, but Mikaele has been lacklustre at best since he returned.

We absolutely have seen the best that Currie has to offer, behind a decent pack. And he’s been held to that regard since. The point is, if his job is to create width and to be a dynamic back rower, not an extra prop, then he is doing that. The issue is we’re not on the front foot, have no momentum and can’t manipulate numbers or make space because the middle is getting bullied.