Mr. Zucchini Head wrote:
I'm not worried. He will be a miss for sure but I have much more faith in the systems than I ever did under Radford and I'm sure whoever comes in will do a solid job.
Question is which way do we go? Do we just back McNamara to partner Sneyd and leave everything else as is? Do you move Connor to 6 and bring in Wynne at full back? Or maybe shift Tuimavave to 6, with either Scott at centre, or Fonua at centre and Faraimo on the wing?
Pros and cons to all of them but I think they are all sound options. I feel like McNamara will get the nod against Fev, and that will be something of an audition to see if he stays there for the Warrington game.
Its a blow to lose a player of the quality of Reynolds especially as to how well he has started the season in the first two games and what he brings but woth Sneyd looking as though he will be fit that does lessen the loss of Reynolds a little.
To be honest the Fev game has probably come at the right time as it gives BH the the chance to give McNamara the opportunity to take his chance and show what he can do. He did well last year when thrown in which the experience will certainly have helped him develop along with a preseason under the new regime.
I don't think there should be any question of moving Jake or Carlos as we have a young guy in McNamara who has the skills to do the job so feel putting square pegs in round holes again would be the wrong way to go. We have players in the squad for that particular position and unless they are given the chance they and we will never improve. Jake and Carlos have both been in good form at FB and centre and should carry on in those positions.
This is why proper structures needed to be in place within the club so we dont have a collapse and need to move players around instead simply slot in the fringe players in their positions ala St's and Wigan.
Our problems before were because we clearly had poor or little structures in place so everyhting fell apart with one or two injuries and why we seemed to have to revert to the square pegs in round holes syndrome.
The Fev game is a good test of not only for McNamara but the 17 matchday squad, the coaching set up and the systems and structures they have implemented. It will also be a good indication as to where we are at.
ATEOTD is we have players in the 1st team squad that are there because they have been good enough to be selected as members of the 1st team squad and are training in their positions then then should be given the opportunity when injuries occur. If not then why bother having them in the squad if there is no faith to put them in the 17 when needed.
I think BH is a strong advocate of playing players in their positions rather than make shift options and in his early media interviews that is the message that seemd to come across from him that all players in the 1st team squad will be given opportunities.