Re: Eaton,Jones and Presley how much will they be missed? : Mon Jan 03, 2011 9:54 am  

If you have watched most of the opposition with quality backs they can pass the ball from one touch line to the other with 3 passes creating space on the opposite wing from where the play the ball took place.

I couldn't agree more!

As I've said on numerous occasions, you can't beat pace and I'm sick and tired of the Cougars keeping the ball in the centre of the field when tthere have been numerous opportunities for them to score out wide.

Tactical kicking, which has been absent since Jason Ramshaw left need to be reintroduced to take the hard work out of making yards. 40/20's aren't the preserve of Superleague so I hope that JD will bring some intelligence with him and be aware of the opportunities.

On numerous occasions last season, when we ran the ball from scrums within our own 10 metre line with the opposing full back being inside our half, we could have easily kicked and, if not winning a 40/20 our wingers could have even regained posession, or at worst pushed the opposing team back to their 20. We've never seemed to be aware of opportunities beyond the next 20 metres and that's what I hope JD will change.

Re: Eaton,Jones and Presley how much will they be missed? : Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:19 am  

666 wrote:

I couldn't agree more!

As I've said on numerous occasions, you can't beat pace and I'm sick and tired of the Cougars keeping the ball in the centre of the field when tthere have been numerous opportunities for them to score out wide.

Tactical kicking, which has been absent since Jason Ramshaw left need to be reintroduced to take the hard work out of making yards. 40/20's aren't the preserve of Superleague so I hope that JD will bring some intelligence with him and be aware of the opportunities.

On numerous occasions last season, when we ran the ball from scrums within our own 10 metre line with the opposing full back being inside our half, we could have easily kicked and, if not winning a 40/20 our wingers could have even regained posession, or at worst pushed the opposing team back to their 20. We've never seemed to be aware of opportunities beyond the next 20 metres and that's what I hope JD will change.

Flippin' heck, I must have had too much beer over new year cos I find myself agreeing with 666

To be fair to the team though, I think we utilised pace better in our promotion year, but just found ourselves wanting in the higher division. I'm not sure we had three players in our whole squad who could reliably throw the type of bullet pass that could move us from one wing to the other that quickly. Jones could, but he also threw some awful high looping passes that were ripe for interception.

Our kicking to touch was dubious to say the least. How many times did we kick the ball flat with little metres gained? Was this down to tactics, or the abilty of the players?

There is nothing that unsettles an opposing team more than pace coupled with a good kicking game especially if you have more than one competent kicker. I would like to see 40/20's, high balls, low kicks between defenders and chip kicks over the top. Unfortunatley, the down side is that if your kickers make mistakes then defenders have a clear run to the line.