Pat didn't kick. Smith did.

I presumed Pat had moved inside for a drop goal attempt but he waved it away and Smith put in a shocker. The chase was woeful/non existant and we were punished.

We need to sort our discipline out though. Yes the shoulder charge rule is a joke but surely we should have realised Child was all over it.

My main gripe is with the forwards. An error-ridden, ill-disciplined display was summed up by Dudson, which is unusual for him, losing the plot on a few occassions. The forwards were more interested in niggling than doing the hard yards. I do have a feeling it is to do with complacency with us mullering them in the forwards the last few times. In addition, Wane's comments of "the points can be picked up later in the season" gave the impression he was willing to lose this one, which I can understand with saturday coming up.

Also, Matty Smith needs to get back to form very quickly. His pass selection last night was shocking and he did not trust Hampshire at all, the attack continually broke down with him.

All will be probably forgotten on saturday if we win which is most likely, however if we play like that London will push us.

You can throw what you want at it, but the fact of the matter is our coach has great difficulty getting our team winning and playing well without Sam Tomkins, it's a fact.

It's very worrying to think Wane has such massive issues minus Sam. Yes Lockers was missing, but there's been times he's played when Sam didn't when we lost.

Blame the pack, whatever, but the one man who we really miss is Sam Tomkins, the record speaks for itself.

Yes we miss Sam but he played at Wire and we lost there without Lockers.
That midfield trio of 6,7 & 13 are all over the place.
Green isn't on form and some distance away but he has played alongside Tuson, Burke, Farrel and Lockers in the 13 shirt since he returned from injury.
Smith at times seems to be trying to hard doing everything, playmaking, taking on the line, field kicking. The whole lot needs sorting out.
Overall, what we need most is a settled team.
There are six SL games left,
At most two Cup games,
Then 3-4 play off games.
That's a maximum of 12 games provided to make the two finals.
To gain enough form to win those we need a settled spine of 1,6,7,9 & 13.
Get them playing even if one isn't 100% fit and we can match anyone.
Play without 2-3 of them and we really struggle.
End this rotation or resting players, they now have to play the season out, injuries permitting, to regain the form which could win us trophies.
One question I asked of those stood around me behind the sticks at Saints was "If this had been a Cup Tie do you think Sam, Lockers and HH would have played"?
Those asked all said yes, which prompted my question in the first place.

Well, wigan's modus operandi since 2010 has been to blitz the opposition in the first 20 minutes and kill the game, then maintain on auto pilot for the remaining 60. I think phil clarke had a stat that of the 4 games this season wigan haven't scored first, they've lost 3 and drawn 1.

Only a few teams in the league have the ability to deal with this intensity so what happens is you get a team like salford, the game will be over after 20 and they're gone, and you'll either get a big big score from wigan, or a scrappy low intensity game like 40 - 10 where it looks like a good win but the performance for 3/4 of the game has been scrappy.

We've seen in the first half of the season especially wigan putting on alot of big big scores, but when they come up against a decent team who start well, they can lack the brains and stomach for the fight. I suppose you could class wigan as they currently are, [iflat track bullies[/i

Will we ever recover from the Warrington game? Its still in the system and the mental fatigue is evident. Physically the players are all carrying niggles and playing on dry rock hard summer pitches isnt helping, somehow Wane has got to inflate the confidence bubble again before the business end of the season, I think he can do it, last nights game was a massive lesson for a lot of players. Better that happened last night and not at Wembley

Says the guy who spends all day laughing at Huddersfield's small crowds rather than offering admiration for their vastly better league performances than his beloved Leeds.

You'd know all about what a vastly superior league performance got you last season.

What ... suddenly we're not talking about bullies anymore?

I wonder why that is.

Because you got defensive?

Excellent defence mechanisms.

Nah. Just sussed you.

Say what you like people...

We'll play London, Sam will feature and Lockers, everyone will click, people will praise other players performances and all will be forgotten.

However the next time Sam doesn't play....

Not really the case though, was it. We were without our two main strike players in Roby and Soliola, and Lomax only just scraped past a fitness test. We played without a Half-Back for 20 minutes. That's not to mention the other five we've had missing long term.

Both teams had players out, but Saints were the better side on the day.

Lost it because yet again the team allowed themselves to be wound up by McCarthy Scarsbrook, Wellans and Wilkin.

Time we cotton on to it.

Yes, but the difference is that we [ichose[/i to leave our best players out, knowing that we had a semi final 6 days later. As I've already said, I'd take losing on Monday if it meant that we win on Saturday.

Possibly - and that is to my way of thinking a sign of inexperience (Dudson and Flower esp), it was noticable that our better forwards on the day (Farrell and possibly Crosby) didn't get dragged in. That is where I think we missed Lockers and Hansen to calm things down and get stuck in without getting too wound up.

We missed a Captain out there.
Someone to marshall the troops, someone to lay down the law about ill discipline, someone to motivate.

MM (IMO) isn't a Captain, (anyway he was only on the field for 20mins) and Pat certainly isn't.
Without SOL, we struggle in that department, with the possible exception of HH. As he wasn't there also, we were rudderless.

The norm appears to be to give the job to the more seasoned player, but from what I've seen of his maturity and temperament, what about Faz?

We used to get dragged in whenever we played Hudds with Brown in charge. Mason constantly wound our pack up and it led to several punch ups.

Brown has his perfect player in LMS because the guy comes across as an utter two hat. (on the park I mean)

It seems to be catching among other clubs as well this week.

The final 20 mins was poor with ill discipline but the first 30 were dreadfull with dropped ball over the place. We must have completed around only 1 - 2 sets in that time. When Josh scored we were trying to reckon if that was our second or third set we'd completed. By which time Saints were 12-0 up.
We had also done probably 75% of the tackling in the heat of the hottest day of the year.
No wonder we were poor in the last 20.
Still don't think that if the Saints game had been a cup tie any of the players rested would have been.

Poor discipline, execution and a weak showing from our forwards. It all combined to a bit of a horror show. They should have really won by more because of those missed penalty kicks...

This. 70-0 not only demonstrates how well we performed but the poor quality of the opposition, would our plays/structures work against a better team minus Sam? That's the worry.

Even with sam it's hit and miss, we already know this. The record against the top teams this year is - beat leeds at MM.

Wigan roll over the fodder with ease, systematically dismantling them. It's hard for me to articulate this, but the play is structured so the players are almost like robots following these set plays over and over again which pick off the weaker teams with ease and rack up big scorelines. But against the top teams who can better handle these structures and plays, theres something lacking.

It seems crazy to suggest that a team putting 80 and 70 points on other super league teams and is near the top isn't a shoe in for silverware, but that's the way I see it.

This season just seems like a carbon copy of last season. Maybe wigan have found something extra from last season, they are in CC final (albeit with a very favourable draw, you must admit)......and good, a wigan warrington final will be fantastic. But i really fancy warrington. That have that little extra.

I totally agree with all of this. That's all I can say about it!

It's called experience.