Quote Seth="Seth"I'm sorry but I have to challenge some of the utter nonsense on this board.
First off, I have been an admirer of McDermott in the past and even through the difficult early stages, though I agree it's time for a change as there is not sign of progression over such a long period. As McDermott alluded to the 17 available should be producing more and regardless of results you need to be getting the best out of them more often than not.
That said, I really don't know what people are expecting of his interviews/press conferences, though at times scathing of the performance (and sometimes not enough in the fans eyes) he's always dignified in his responses and pretty honest. We can all accept he's probably had his time but to call him arrogant for not stepping aside after half a season (albeit a dreadful one) if you weren't producing in your job would you just step aside into unemployment. Fair enough have an opinion but questioning peoples character unjustly is pretty low.
For a man that clearly cares so much, regardless of whether hes performing, hes holding himself together in the interviews pretty well in the circumstances.'"
Well said.
It is quite obvious our problems run much deeper that a change of coach and many in the squad without the on-field leadership and direction of Sinny and JP are simply not good enough. For many of the games this year we have been in with a chance at half time despite not playing well only to capitulate for periods of the second half on the back of a series of individual errors. As soon as the opposition get on a roll you can see some heads go down and the worst offenders are certain senior players. This has and constant absentees has meant our low and fragile confidence keeps getting shattered when the going gets tough.
Watkins seems to be in a dream and is just coasting along. For Warrington's first try he came in as 3rd tackler quite unnecessarily as the tackle was completed and instead of quickly retreating back into line he chose to stay as 2nd marker leaving one of our two tacklers who had done the work to have make a late retreat. This in turn meant our numbers were down on the blind side and they had the overlap.
Watkins is not the only one to take a lazy rest as 2nd marker, Singleton has this off to a tee taking a rest 12 times at marker last night. If we are to commit 3 players or more to the tackle we have to dominate and turn the attacker over to slow the PTB. The players already know how to do this as the same players have done this many times previously. However they do not have Daddy on the field now to tell them where to stand.
Hardaker looks to have lost his bottle as he is loitering away from the fray to avoid both the bombs and hanging back and not covering the line breaks. This is putting unfair work and pressure on our young wingers. Last season he would have been coming for these all day.
For the vast majority of games we have lacked an experienced play-maker at standoff to turn field position into points and create more opportunities and take better decisions so IMO this is the first priority. We do need a replacement for Falloon but had we had Clark in our side last night it would only have stopped the ones he scored for Warrington himself because he couldn't have prevented the ones we let in due to sloppy marking, missed tackles and lazy marking. Until the coach has a fuller squad so he is able to drop those offenders I cannot see much improvement soon even with a change of coach.
I still wonder if there is some negative off field problem we do not know about that has had an effect on the some of the players mental attitude but the players IMO owe the supporters and the coach better performances than they are serving up.
Perhaps a spell in the middle 8s will allow the opportunity to regain form and confidence as momentum is all against us now.
