Hello all
Let me explain a bit further; let's look at the stats.
Each of our outside backs made a minimum of 12 carries and the average looks to be about 14 per man.
Each of our forwards, aside from Moore made 11 or fewer carries. The average looks about 9 for guys who play long minutes and only about 6 for the rest.
This means we have forwards making about one carry every 8 minutes (if they are on for the full game) or every 4 minutes if they are rotated.
Now you would expect us to have about two sets of possession in 4 minutes and the data is telling us that forwards are making less than half of the carries in the game, so only 1 carry each in the two sets.
What I am saying is that we would be better to make sure that on just about every set we have Cook, Greenwood and Vea running onto the ball and making a carry. (This is what Cas did with Andy Lynch who made 23 carries). These three would be in effect our "attacking" forwards from planned moves. They would become almost a little unit to share the brunt of the attacking work.
Whilst the guys who make fewer metres like Griffin, Slyney and Foster I would be saying to them that that they should share the brunt of the defensive work.
In essence, we want to make sure that we reduce the 'voluntary mismatch' where you put e.g. an Alex Foster against bigger players to drive the ball in, the kid is a great tackler make sure you keep him on that.
In an ideal world we'd be making sure that ALL the forwards are running the ball much more often. I know that many coaches are happy to put in the outside backs to 'share the work' and make carries early in the set. But this only works when you have wingers with a physique that would make them genuinely competitive with forwards or the ability to evade.
What we are seeing instead is backs making fewer metres when making drives or even being pushed back on drives and it cannot be helping them or us. It would be better if they are fresher for when the ball comes wide given the lack of defensive quality being shown after they have been mangled making these drives. And you can't tell me that the forwards cannot go from 9 drives to lets say 14? That would be about 50 extra drives between the starting six and the three or four on the bench if shared equally. And we might start to create some momentum!
By the way, I am pretty furious with the pitiful effort but also one thing in my mind is that the chances of seeing good Rugby League in London in the future depends on sticking with the team now. If everyone gives up, then we will be a Championship club watched by a few hundred and won't ever return to the top flight. It is going to be hard to watch the next 20 games. But what will be harder is to see the club go. Given that we've lost about 1800 from 2800 I really do fear for the club I must say, but I can understand Londoners not wanting to watch drubbings.
The only positive thing I can say today is that, if we look at the table, we are still in the mix with a very fair chance of avoiding relegation if we can come to life. We are not marooned - we are still only 2 points (effectively 3 points) from being outside the relegation zone. But we must now do a Lazarus.
PS I counted 37 missed tackles in the stats