There wasn't much to choose between the sides in the first hour, London were the stronger team and had better position and possession and we took the few opportunities we had.
A piece of individual brilliance from Dixon and a powerful run from Cook was the only difference whilst Hull didn't really threaten except with their try. A 13+ gap for London would have probably settled it, but we did not really get into their half for the last twenty minutes.
Hull Fc were definitely on top for the last 20 minutes with a lot of off-loads. dominance in position and possession and making the metres that they had not for the first hour. This was partly down to their willingness to play adventurous football, perhaps greater fitness, one or two dubious calls, tiredness and fatigue from London and fact that we had several players not able to go back on added to the tiredness.
They were also buoyed by the non-stop work from Danny Houghton at Hooker exploiting the weaker marking and the realization that we had brought on one of the weakest defenders in the competition for the last ten minutes and who they could attack non-stop - which they did, gaining two tries in the end.
Obviously you cannot be grateful with a draw when you are winning with two minutes to go, but another few minutes and I believe we would have lost, such was the momentum shift.
Two wins and a draw from March is pretty reasonable but there have been plenty of missed opportunities against the weaker teams. However I believe the competition as a whole is weaker than in the past - in fact, far weaker - with a lack of quality players from the NRL over the past two to three years and the Australians here mainly in their early 30s.
I would only say that Wigan and Warrington are a class apart from us, whilst I would have been able to add in several more names in the past, so I can see us gaining more points against the bigger clubs and maybe staying outside the bottom three. Salford are guaranteed bottom, with Koukash talking about players like Tomkins and Morley but it is all PR - he is really just signing players from Hudderfield reserves.
In the next few months Tony can start to make signings of his own for next year and release all the players that Mac and Powell signed that he doesn't want, so that will cheer us up no end, I am sure.
