Looking at the whole picture, you can only look at the progress made and be satisfied that we were in the conversation in both competitions, even more so when you consider the player movements during the year. Kasiano, Dwyer, Dudson, Bullock, Russell all shown the door, without being replaced for long periods and the academy contributing massively. Add players like Thomas, Wrench and Hayes who while they are young, they were part of the plan and in Wrench and Hayes’s case were first choice at one point. All in all, there is huge improvement and you can see there is more in that group.
With all that said, we have to think like champions. We have to think ruthless. We have to unpick why we ended up empty handed, and a part of that is understanding the rationale behind the use of subs. We saw Musgrove play 14 minutes last week, Vaughan with limited minutes again from the bench, changing back from Powell starting to Walker despite that looking like a good, balanced partnership. Did Bateman deliver what we needed?
There are lessons to be learned, and I hope we’re not too busy patting ourselves on the back to be doing a full review and preparing to go further next year. We have to kick the door down next year, Wigan won the lot last year and still went out and recruited, including (albeit a bad call) finding a goal kicker in Keighran. If nothing else, it put the rocket under Smith to develop his kicking. I’m not saying we go and buy, but we need to turn 4 into 6, especially in the games that matter.
