According to the interweb a RL/RU pitch should ideally be close too 133 × 74 yards - which includes the in goal area. The Leyton Orient pitch was squat at 115 x 80 yards. I guess that's why the Bulls kicker was still practising his kickoffs while the Cowgirls were doing their pre-match routine.

Our three-quarter line are like the bear cubs on planet live, willing but hopeless when confronted by a top predator! How much better Gale and Pryce look now that they have a good coach. The ref was awful. The Orient experience was a good one, great view, compact stadium and a good atmosphere in the first half. How many chances is Powell going to get?????????????????????????????

Couple of blatant head shots by both teams ignored, then one that was round the shoulder was penalised!
As for Bryant running in after what our lads thought was a "late off the ball hit" when will players learn, the ref has not blown for it running in and throwing handbags aint going to make him go "oops missed that sorry lads"
we still gave away needless mtrs
And when oh when are SL officials going to start making packs bind properly in the scrum, the Bradfurt Loose did not even have his arms in the scrum!!

Rule book states that pitch should be as close to max dimensions as possible, but does not state min acceptable
Pitch dimensions are stated in Mtrs Not Yards
max being 122 by 68 with ingoal areas 11mtrs each end

I know that, but on the Orient site their pitch dimensions was stated in yards and I couldn't be bothered converting it to meters.

Powell has another 14 lives left. Anybody know wht his comments were post game?

Head coach Rob Powell said: "We played well in the first half but you can't afford to complete at 53 percent, which was out second half completion. They were simple errors, not through trying to play and trying to pass - just not coming up with the ball. We did that five or six times that, compounded with Michael Platt scoring four tries on our left hand side, was the game."

Apparently the Broncos coach, Rob Powell, said: "We had the game in our hands and we have let them off the hook. Bradford should not have been only six points behind at half-time after the way we started. We made too many simple errors in the second half and our completion rate was poor.

"I thought we defended well throughout but when you make that many errors it will always be tough. They scored four tries going through one man and that will have to be a learning experience for us."

Agree with some of those comments but one player responsible, rather than the coach being able to change tactics and structures during the game?

Quite right too....enjoy it whilst you can, because as it stands at the moment, 2,702 fans per game won't pay the bills once DH is gone and there isn't a line of other insane investors waiting to flush 1.5 million down the drain every year



We lost.....we should have won, but we didn't. The Club should accept the fact that the coach isn't up to the job and be looking to replace him...

FWIW, I believe we will be spanked rotten in Huddesfield, then attract a crowd of near 4,000 in Kent, with over 1,000 of those in attendance being local kids on freebies....the club will announce that it was a massive success and then we will get another sub 3k gate for the visit of Widnes......nothing ever changes at the club.....until David Hughes walks, I honestly believe it never will.

Back to the rugby...another 2am alarm call to listen to that dross.............I am thankful I didn't have a 2 hour journey home after the final whistle though

First Half was good second not so good

I thought it was quite an entertaining game watching from the stands and not being overly cynical about the performance. Hicks was the real damp squib today. Nice to see us lose at a different 'home' ground though

I do agree with some of your comments but disagree with a few of them too. Quite aware the clock is ticking and frankly feel nowt is being done to stop it ticking. Went to a local pub today and not a poster in sight it does make you wonder what if anything is actually been done. However just once on this forum is there a chance of discussing the 80 minutes rather than the 166 hours and 40 minutes of no planning, marketing etc that is the basis of this club



And for a change the journey was only 1 hour.

Different ground (was impressed with the O's ground, hadn't been there since about 1980!), good atmos - sounded like a lot more than 2,800 at times,great first 15 mins, don't think we had more than a couple of mins in the Bulls half in the 2nd half, same old mistakes, same old excuses, same old defeat from the jaws of victory! And Mr Hicks was .....Mr Hicks!
On the plus side only took about 45 mins to get home - stuff it let's move East!

High Points - First 15 mins & seeing some lady hanging her washing out on one of the balconies overlooking the ground!

Low Points - same old mistakes and defensive frailties and two hour plus journey from Haslemere to the ground

Given the state of the second half it surely is up to the coach to change direction and tactics makes you think doesn't apart from those making high level decisions in the club. Second from bottom is my prediction and out of the cup next week, plus falling crowds. It is a crime given the supposed calibre of the individual players in the current squad that we are where we are in terms of league position, wake up DH, Gus otherwise forget SL in London after the next license review. However on a positive note prefer Orient to the Stoop.

Found the answer; Answer: 115 yd = 105.156 m for the football pitch. Assume today's game on the main pitch around 85 - 90 metres!

Brisbane Road is not a Superleague standard Ground and doesn't have a capacity of 10,000.

Interestingly, championship clubs need to average 2,500 fans per game to be considered for a licence.....we are currently on 2,702.....

[urlhttp://www.therfl.co.uk/~therflc/about/page.php?areaid=193[/url

Do you really believe that doesn't happen in a game?

Despite allegedly spending up to the salary cap the reality is that we have the under 20s backline of O'Callaghan, Channing, Sarginson and Dixon all in with Robertson playing at fullback. This has partly come about because no out and out centres were purchased and because players with a long history of missing games were signed or retained. However this backline could have been peppered with experience by bringing in Melling and Dorn.

The use of substitutes yesterday was shameful in giving potential match winner Luke Dorn a five minute cameo and leaving young Ben Bolger to run up and down the line for no reason was an insult. I would have selected four from Lamont, Rob T, Sam B, Ben B and Wheeldon to relieve the guys against a big Bradford side rather than play with 15.

I would suggest that the gate was reasonable given that the club has lost the majority of the floating support and even some of the core support because David Hughes has failed to appoint someone supporters believe in. I don't want to go away anymore because I am fed up of this sour faced incompetent. But I am even more sad than angry. It is like being a football supporter knowing that you will concede three goals a game as a minimum and that it will be a shock to beat Salford or Bradford.

Knew we were doomed when fans started chanting "easy easy" at 16-0 up

Sums it up for me really.

I'm afraid to say I could see the result coming at half time - we'd squandered a good start and let them back into it with a couple of soft tries. As mentioned, subs policy increasingly bizarre - Did Dorn come on again after his 13 minute spell straddling the end of the 1st and start of 2nd half? What is the point?

Credit to Bradford I thought they produced a very efficient and well drilled second half performance. They wore us down and capitalised on errors, which we committed a multitude of. Everyone seems to be bagging Hicks and I think he had a pretty shoddy game but I don't think any of his calls materially affected the result. Bradford were on balance the better side.

We are halfway through the season and have 2 wins. We are 10 points off the top 8 which was laughably supposed to be our target. Shameful. This is a results-driven business and Rob Powell has shown he cannot achieve those results. How he's still in a job, well, I can't explain it.

Same here, 50 minutes there 45 back compared to 4 hours round trip via train to the Stoop. Really easy journey down the A127/A12, even folk coming from Southend would get there in 1hr 10 minutes or so. Theres a good potential fan base in Essex as the only pro sports to compete with all the way along the Thames corridor and up through Chelmsford etc is football and to a lesser extent speedway (who race Friday nights anyway).
Enjoyed the game if not the result but judging by the reaction and mood of those around me i would say the day was a success plus its our 2nd biggest, albiet low, crowd of the season.

Speedway lol

Moving to a football club still presents the following issues

- Being kicked out in the summer a la Griffin Park
- Having to play home games on sundays (most of the time, one would assume)
- In Orient's case, it's not SL-license worthy?
- No idea on rent figures but it could conceivably cost more than The Stoop, which is a purpose built rugby facility.

Why isn't orient SL quality? Would be one of the best grounds in the comp and 10k a pretty arbitrary number TBH. Not like we've ever got anyway near it?

[urlhttp://www.therfl.co.uk/~therflc/about/page.php?areaid=193[/url
10k ground is the minimum, but as you say, we have only ever reported 1 SL crowd of that size.....and 10,000 of them were either on the way home or in the bar when the game was on



Gotta love the posts saying East is best on here......I repeat, that was the second lowest gate for a Bradford Superleague game in 17 years.....AND apparently was achieved with advertising in the local papers and the buy in from the hosts, who promoted the game heavily