A coach get sacked and so you just want to blame everything on him and no give him credit where it’s due.
Was Hookem not a full time professional who trained week in week out. And yet he still couldn’t get any game time. He had 0 game time but whilst he was on the pitch he missed 1 in 6 tackles without any fatigue. Tony smith doesn’t seem bothered about keeping him either.
Hodgson picked up Gardner and Laidlow from playing amateur rugby and gave them game time. Think that shows he wasn’t against giving game time to those who deserved it. Add to the Kye Armstrong, Charlie Severs, Balmforth, Davy Litten and Harvey Barron.
You’ve made a decision that Hookem is good enough to play off 4 appearances in which he had limited game time and was pretty anonymous when on the pitch.
Harvey Barron and Darnell McIntosh are good example of our fan base picking players they like and don’t like. Fans rave over Barron and if McIntosh was in his position in the wakey & HKR game we probably beat wakey and who knows against rovers. (I’m not saying he’s not got a future but he’s not ready yet). Fans still refuse to accept that and were criticising AP, a fan himself, for getting frustrated at his errors.
McIntosh on the other hand came off a bad injury and was pretty steady and our top try scorer. But because he dropped the ball in the derby (which went back) fans turned on him and every error after was in the spot light.
I’m fed up of fans wanting to just stick the knife in BH, he came, he wasn’t successful and he’s gone now. But that doesn’t mean everything going on in the club was his fault.
I'm not blaming everything on BH and I haven't seen anyone suggesting such but the reality was his tenure was abject failure, with a team that was seemingly so fractured and poor attitude all round. Yes the players were pro players and the senior/leadership group should know better however as a Head Coach there is a responsibility in that role which certainly was not met.
I never said Hookem was good enough or not either way that's your incorrect assumption, I simply stated that its a shame he is leaving as it would have been good to see how he went if given a chance under Tony Smith, as under BH I don't think Hookem was really given a decent chance but thats sport.
As for giving the youngsters you mentioned game time they were hardly giving much, Barron and Laidlaw the ones that got the most which was more out of circumstance than planned opportunity. Armstrong, Severs, Balmforth and Litten hardly played.
As for fans sticking the knife in to BH again I don't see that, all I see is fans stating the obvious and facts of what was witnessed week in week out and the same mistakes being made over and over again.
Unfortunately whilst BH is a nice guy as a head coach at Hull he failed and by some margin as results and performances showed.
Re hookem., No one on here knows for sure how he was treated. If indeed, he leaves for Cas then TS must also be comfortable with that… so does that tell you something? salary cap ! we can’t keep every player. It’s recognised that the squad need a back row forward. To enable that to happen then players currently on the books will have to leave
I'm not blaming everything on BH and I haven't seen anyone suggesting such but the reality was his tenure was abject failure, with a team that was seemingly so fractured and poor attitude all round. Yes the players were pro players and the senior/leadership group should know better however as a Head Coach there is a responsibility in that role which certainly was not met.
I never said Hookem was good enough or not either way that's your incorrect assumption, I simply stated that its a shame he is leaving as it would have been good to see how he went if given a chance under Tony Smith, as under BH I don't think Hookem was really given a decent chance but thats sport.
As for giving the youngsters you mentioned game time they were hardly giving much, Barron and Laidlaw the ones that got the most which was more out of circumstance than planned opportunity. Armstrong, Severs, Balmforth and Litten hardly played.
As for fans sticking the knife in to BH again I don't see that, all I see is fans stating the obvious and facts of what was witnessed week in week out and the same mistakes being made over and over again.
Unfortunately whilst BH is a nice guy as a head coach at Hull he failed and by some margin as results and performances showed.
But these "performances" the same players are still here and was here when they did the same under radford
Houghton, taylor, Griffin, Carlos, shaul, Lane, fash still here from 2018 wakey Warrington record hammerings etc
But these "performances" the same players are still here and was here when they did the same under radford
Houghton, taylor, Griffin, Carlos, shaul, Lane, fash still here from 2018 wakey Warrington record hammerings etc
we going to blame Smith another coach?
It's the players not the coach
So what was BH doing as the Head Coach & KP as his assistant? His tenure was unfortunately an abject failure in dealing with long standing issues we had seen even under Radford such as poor discipline, poor basic skill set, unable to put 80min performances in, players under performing week in week out and these are just a few on a long list.
The players are far from blameless but unfortunately the Head Coaches main responsibility is the performance and results of the first team and for me it was evident BH was way out of his depth and simply had no authority over the group and we had the tail wagging the dog. There was no responsibility or accountability and it would seem BH was either too nice a guy or just not strong enough to take to task certain players who continually dished up one poor performance after another.
However all this is old news and we have now had a major overhaul of the coaching and conditioning/fitness set up, AP has brought in an experienced head coach with a proven track record which has been needed. Hopefully the changes made will see an improvement in performances and attitude, time will tell.
And do we have the cap for him, if I had the choice of him or no one I'd take Longstaff, but I'd rather go wiry what we have and see who becomes available, lacks size and power (both I attack and defence), if Savelio is out a backrow of Lane, Longstaff and Cator would be far too small.
Might not need a second rower given the size Carlos has put on up top.
Always been massive has Carlos, could do well in the backrow IMO, got size, strength and defence, would mean one of Mitch, Wynne, Scott or Griffin to play centre though, are any of them good enough to play centre regularly?