Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sat Apr 22, 2017 10:27 pm  

lefty goldblatt wrote:

I'm not going today.
It's my own fault, but as I saw the fixture with a 3 p.m. kick off time, I naturally assumed it was a Sunday game. As I'm already down on a golf competition's start sheet, with a tee off time of 2 p.m., I automatically thought "why should I disrupt my day, just to go and watch Warrington, when they've been boring the t1t5 off me, for the last few seasons".
.....and there lays the problem. WE'RE BORING.

For a few seasons now, we've been on a steady downward spiral of unimaginative rugby. The last 2 - 3 years have been pitiful, in terms of entertainment.

I went went to last GF with my brother (who was a home regular from the end of the 80's to the beginning of SL, but still watches us on TV, now), and as we left, he turned to me and said "that was awful. Joyless rugby". I agreed with him. IT IS. I couldn't deny it. To use a football analogy, we've almost become like Arsenal under George Graham/Don Howe. Dull but effective. One Nil to the Ars-en-al is now prevalent to us

We don't beat men, anymore. We never look for gaps, 50 yards out. We don't take risks. We have wingers making "the hard yards", and forwards finishing the end of sets of six. SURELY THAT'S THE WRONG WAY ROUND, or am I missing something.?

We've got an NFL "legend" on the pitch, but all he does is shout. I want to see exhilarating rugby from him. All I get is crash balls, or a dive over try from a play the ball.

Patton. He looks to have a great kicking game, but ball in hand, he's merely so-so. As somebody said on the Hudds game thread, bar the stadium announcer calling his name, you wouldn't know he'd played.

Bar the opening few games of last season, when Sandow was playing "off the cuff rugby" we've been painful to watch for 5 years, and it boils down to Smith and his acolyte Agar.

I'd love to know why Poching left the club. An assistant here, overseeing exciting rugby, he then "goes" to HKR to fulfill the same role, but at a club with nowhere near our ambition/capabilities. Very strange. Since then, we've steadily declined, in terms of entertainment. No coincidence.

Let the ostriches on here come up with 2 runners ups and a LLS, for last season. That's their prerogative. I go to rugby to be entertained. Not to have the equivalent of 1980's Italian football served up to me.

So, to those who are going this afternoon, I hope we win, but most of all, I hope you are entertained. You deserve it. I've not been for ages.
I'll have my mobile on silent, but checking for updates. I'm just hoping I sink a few putts on the course.

Come on Wire.

I can totally sympathize with the points you make Lefty.

I've found it increasingly difficult (until this season) to find the motivation to get to games, purely driven by the style of play now on offer.

I think we were lucky on a couple of fronts through 2011 and 2012: our style of play was brilliant to watch, and in the main it was successful. I could stomach the lack of GF wins (even though I thought we 'deserved it'), purely as we were fun to watch.

However, the rot had already set in for much of Super League by then, with the dual effect of dropping standards (driven by fewer and lower quality imports), and a change in the style of play. We were saved from this by a coach who encouraged open play and players who embraced it and had the skills to exploit it.

Since then, we've lost those players, not been able to replace them with
adequate alternatives (I don't lay the blame for this on the club, as I'm not sure who else we could have brought in: quality options just don't seem available), and had to adapt our style both to contend with other teams and their changed approach, and utilize the players we have; I don't think this is Smith's natural style (it's not how we played under him at first, or Leeds before that), but I don't think he's had any other choice given available resource.

Now we have no forwards who can offload like Solomona, Carvell, etc, our halves have little creative flair, and our backs (apart from
Atkins) seem devoid of any real attacking prowess. We still have some good players, relative to their peers in SL, but the nature of the game has changed and the standard has dropped. I reckon Saints in 2014 were by a distance the worse team I've ever seen be crowned champs; things have improved a bit since then, but not much.

We've remained competitive through this period which has retained some interest, and for me personally this year has offered the chance to get my eldest daughter interested in the sport. But I largely have little interest in many neutral games now as the entertainment Lefty refers to just isn't there.

With any luck Cas can do something this year to change the view on how to win; ideally Wigan will bomb too, to prove the alternative doesn't work, but I fear the bad will out, and the current vogue will continue for a while yet.

This for me is a stronger reason to switch away from Smith than the fact we haven't won a GF under him, or lost our first 6 this year. I no longer remain convinced he is the best man to lead the players likely to be at his disposal to victory in a league played under these type of conditions.

I expect (hope?!) this is just a phase and the game will evolve back into something worthy of being called entertainment again, as dummy half scoots and 'attacking kicks to the corner' really don't float my boat.

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sat Apr 22, 2017 11:13 pm  

I've been feeling the same for the last two years now. Just can't be arsed at all. Went to Catalan away and been to Leeds at home but that's all this year. I'm still "interested" as will watch on TV but the whole game just isn't interesting me as much as it used to. I used to wake up on game day looking forward to the game but lately I just couldn't really care less. Thought it was just me getting old but obviously I'm not the only one feeling like this.

Not just Warrington, super league in general is mickey poor at the minute. The recent salary cap changes won't make a dent in the problem either.

Sad.

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sun Apr 23, 2017 8:14 am  

lefty goldblatt wrote:

I'm not going today.
It's my own fault, but as I saw the fixture with a 3 p.m. kick off time, I naturally assumed it was a Sunday game. As I'm already down on a golf competition's start sheet, with a tee off time of 2 p.m., I automatically thought "why should I disrupt my day, just to go and watch Warrington, when they've been boring the t1t5 off me, for the last few seasons".
.....and there lays the problem. WE'RE BORING.

For a few seasons now, we've been on a steady downward spiral of unimaginative rugby. The last 2 - 3 years have been pitiful, in terms of entertainment.

I went went to last GF with my brother (who was a home regular from the end of the 80's to the beginning of SL, but still watches us on TV, now), and as we left, he turned to me and said "that was awful. Joyless rugby". I agreed with him. IT IS. I couldn't deny it. To use a football analogy, we've almost become like Arsenal under George Graham/Don Howe. Dull but effective. One Nil to the Ars-en-al is now prevalent to us

We don't beat men, anymore. We never look for gaps, 50 yards out. We don't take risks. We have wingers making "the hard yards", and forwards finishing the end of sets of six. SURELY THAT'S THE WRONG WAY ROUND, or am I missing something.?

We've got an NFL "legend" on the pitch, but all he does is shout. I want to see exhilarating rugby from him. All I get is crash balls, or a dive over try from a play the ball.

Patton. He looks to have a great kicking game, but ball in hand, he's merely so-so. As somebody said on the Hudds game thread, bar the stadium announcer calling his name, you wouldn't know he'd played.

Bar the opening few games of last season, when Sandow was playing "off the cuff rugby" we've been painful to watch for 5 years, and it boils down to Smith and his acolyte Agar.

I'd love to know why Poching left the club. An assistant here, overseeing exciting rugby, he then "goes" to HKR to fulfill the same role, but at a club with nowhere near our ambition/capabilities. Very strange. Since then, we've steadily declined, in terms of entertainment. No coincidence.

Let the ostriches on here come up with 2 runners ups and a LLS, for last season. That's their prerogative. I go to rugby to be entertained. Not to have the equivalent of 1980's Italian football served up to me.

So, to those who are going this afternoon, I hope we win, but most of all, I hope you are entertained. You deserve it. I've not been for ages.
I'll have my mobile on silent, but checking for updates. I'm just hoping I sink a few putts on the course.

Come on Wire.

This ^^^

I like Smith and I've enjoyed what he's done for us. However in sport every so often a full 'reset' is what's needed and a whole new and fresh approach. Even with last years exploits, the team didn't look like a champion team, and 2015 / 2017 have showed that Smith is unlikely to repeat the glory years with the team he's built himself.

I feel bad saying that, but I feel it's the truth. Who is out there to replace him? I really don't know. The good young British coaches are now tied down to good deals at their respective clubs. Maybe time to take a punt on an untested Aussie assistant? Would wait until the end if the season of course, to ensure we at least stay up this season. The downside of that is that there's nothing left to look forward to this season - I expect an early exit from the cup and a finish in 8th/9th as the only game we've won convincingly was against Leeds and even then it was touch and go for a period.

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sat Apr 29, 2017 10:55 am  

Mark wrote:

Fancy that. Another win. Where are all the haters now?

Probably where you are now... again.

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sat Apr 29, 2017 11:01 am  

Actually that's not very fair.. there is a large section of this board that would like a new coach.... and they have been consistent in saying the same things after victories and after defeats.

So they haven't really gone anywhere. Not really the same story for the people on the other side of the fence, so to speak.

[Uncle Rico]

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sat Apr 29, 2017 12:15 pm  

morleys_deckchair wrote:

Actually that's not very fair.. there is a large section of this board that would like a new coach.... and they have been consistent in saying the same things after victories and after defeats.

So they haven't really gone anywhere. Not really the same story for the people on the other side of the fence, so to speak.

Here's what's not very fair, the posters that try to eek out ANY form of positivity, or clutch onto ANY glimmer of hope are labelled ostriches, superfans and happy clappers, whereas most of these posters have tried to take a balanced view.

Read the posts and I think you'll find that most aren't totally happy with the situation, it isn't a case of blind faith idiocy, they realise that something has to change and that is where there is discord, the what needs to be done about it and when. Is it a good thing that the mantra of the negative posters are so consistent week on week, you seem to think it is? Whereas I don't, it's often simplistic and dull IMO. If there is a win, well it was only against so and so, it should have been by more, it should have been more entertaining.....

I'm not crying in my beer btw everyone is entitled to an opinion on the causes and remedies of our current situation, it's a shame that it is in such a state that we find ourselves with a fence to be divided by. It shouldn't be a case of anyone going into hiding should the team get a result that doesn't suit their agenda win or lose how daft would that be?

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Sat Apr 29, 2017 3:04 pm  

morleys_deckchair wrote:

Actually that's not very fair.. there is a large section of this board that would like a new coach.... and they have been consistent in saying the same things after victories and after defeats.

So they haven't really gone anywhere. Not really the same story for the people on the other side of the fence, so to speak.

Too true, I want a new organ grinder and monkey. I'm sick of hearing the current same old tune.
TS is being carried off the back of what we achieved with a Paul Cullen squad.
I don't care if we won the double in 2017. He's been a flop.

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Tue May 02, 2017 7:29 am  

Uncle Rico wrote:

Here's what's not very fair, the posters that try to eek out ANY form of positivity, or clutch onto ANY glimmer of hope are labelled ostriches, superfans and happy clappers, whereas most of these posters have tried to take a balanced view.

If we end up in the middle 8's it'll be the first time in this clubs entire history that we've ever played outside the top flight. 140 years. And we'll be doing it with, on paper, one of the most talented squads in the league.

The way we're going we'll lose to saints, get banged at magic then we've got another double bank holiday fixure weekend the week after. We can't drop any more than two more games all season. If we do, we'll be stuck in the middle 8's.

Find some positivity in that.

[Uncle Rico]

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Tue May 02, 2017 7:46 am  

moving on... wrote:

If we end up in the middle 8's it'll be the first time in this clubs entire history that we've ever played outside the top flight. 140 years. And we'll be doing it with, on paper, one of the most talented squads in the league.

The way we're going we'll lose to saints, get banged at magic then we've got another double bank holiday fixure weekend the week after. We can't drop any more than two more games all season. If we do, we'll be stuck in the middle 8's.

Find some positivity in that.

Moving On, it's either been said by you or another poster that we'll lose our top flight tag if we don't make the top 8 well I'm not convinced. It might be a different part of the same season but it's not the same as relegation, play in the middle 8's and we could of course drop down a division at the END of that process.

Anyway, having read your post here are the positives "most talented squads in the league" must give us a chance of turning it around and perhaps more telling you start off with "If" and pretty much end with "If" with a run of predicted defeats in the middle.

So yes it's hard to "find some positivity in that" but that's the way you've written it, it's not happened....yet

Re: 2017 and Tony Smith : Tue May 02, 2017 8:14 am  

Surely losing your "top flight status" only happens when you start the next season in the Championship?