Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Wed Jan 24, 2018 6:49 pm  

Doesn't Andrade's sister play for the womens team?

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Thu Jan 25, 2018 1:10 pm  

Yes mate

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Fri Jan 26, 2018 9:33 pm  

Not sure if anyone here knew but the game was streamed online tonight - I just watched it. The stream had about 400 viewers and the attendance at the match was announced as about 2,400 which is pretty impressive for a pre season friendly!

As for the game, I think we could have kept playing until midnight and we still wouldn't have scored

Genuinely think keeping Peltier and Crossley fit this season will be just as important as keeping Chisholm fit. Without them our pack is wafer thin.

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Fri Jan 26, 2018 10:01 pm  

Toronto clearly a class above. Unfortunately for them, it looks like Rowley has learnt nothing from 2015 as it felt like DeJaVu. Some unnecessary ill-discipline from them which allowed us field position. Against better opposition, their ill-discipline will cost them.

Decent hit out for us. Toronto could easily have run away with it, but we stuck at it. As Northus said, we need to keep Crossley and Peltier fit. Hopefully Keyes and maybe Chisholm will get some game time against Keighley. Think Kirk took a knock early on and didn't come back on.

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Sat Jan 27, 2018 3:21 am  

Fully agree. Went with the expectation of a 50-60 point (if not more) beating after I saw the 20 man squad Toronto was going to use. Was happy that we rallied in defence in the first half after leaking a few tries early doors. Stood up well to a lot of their sweeping plays.

McNally looked like a natural fullback. Always backing up expecting an offload and against League 1 sides he'll get a few of those.

Lack of halfbacks really showed close to the line and the passes from the hooker to the halves were poor. Too much loop in the pass which slowed it down and didn't give the halves any time at all allowing Toronto to get up and close anything down. However I would like to praise the makeshift halves for forcing 3 (I counted three anyway) goal line drop outs. Don't think we've had that many in a game in a while.

Pack looks lightweight if Peltier or Crossley go down so hopefully Andrade, Davies and Goodall will get better. If not we could struggle up front.

Anyone know exactly what happened with the bit of handbags in the first half?

[Bulliac]

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Sat Jan 27, 2018 10:25 am  

Bull Mania wrote:

Toronto clearly a class above. Unfortunately for them, it looks like Rowley has learnt nothing from 2015 as it felt like DeJaVu. Some unnecessary ill-discipline from them which allowed us field position. Against better opposition, their ill-discipline will cost them.

Decent hit out for us. Toronto could easily have run away with it, but we stuck at it. As Northus said, we need to keep Crossley and Peltier fit. Hopefully Keyes and maybe Chisholm will get some game time against Keighley. Think Kirk took a knock early on and didn't come back on.

Completely agree about Toronto, they are a good side but their dermination to constantly play right at the edge of what is legal, is going to cost them against better opposition and a stronger referee. Full of qualty though and their biggest other danger is possibly going to be losing concentration against limited opposition.

From our perspective, we were outclassed, simple as. Our forwards just weren't as strong, try as they did, and they did well in patches, it wouldn't have made much diference to our attack without any recognised halves. I was happy that we kept our shape to the end which bodes well for the season to come as we certainly won't meet anyone in the same class as the Canadians. Given the strength of the opposition I'm not in the least worried about the score to be honest, as I'm pretty certain Toronto will be posting even bigger scores against championship teams during the coming season.

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Sat Jan 27, 2018 10:42 am  

You could have put Leigh shirts on all the Toronto players and not spotted the difference between the way they play, when they meet on the field i can see there being more than a few handbags at 5 paces with the tactics they employ.
We still need a few more ideas in attack but on the whole i was not disappointed in the performance (apart from the poor ref) whilst Toronto were faster of the mark and had more speed in attack we matched them for physical effort and did not look as tired at the final whistle.

COYB

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Sat Jan 27, 2018 11:38 am  

I have to agree with most of what has been said about Toronto - they certainly play on the limit of the rules. I can't remember so many forward passes being called in one game but there were a few missed ass well. Having said that with the possible exception of Hull KR I can't recall seeing any championship team last year in the same class as the Toronto I saw last night. Also I don't think we need to be too despondent about the result. What pleased me most is that we kept going right until the end - no question of simply throwing in the towel.A few good performances too particularly Steve Crossley and I thought Andrade did OK for the short time he was on. COYB

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Sat Jan 27, 2018 7:53 pm  

Unbelievable crowd for a pre-season friendly on a cold night with zero away support.

I was also pleasantly surprised at the relatively low scoreline. My only beef was our very poor and disorganised attack. When we did have possession in their half, too often the line was static and flat, and over and over again players were getting the ball stood still, and getting tackled before they had moved. As a result, we kept spilling the ball and losing yards.

Last plays were also very ropey, the best we had were crossfield kicks to the winger, but that just got the ball caught and then instant tackle. No kicks behind the line, no planned plays from kicks.

We were very considerably outmuscled, so it is great credit that they stuck at it and in fact in the last quarter forced a few dropouts.

I don't think halfbacks would have made much difference as we were defending most of the game.

All in all a goof hitout. We won't be meeting many Torontos in this league, and as that's the best team we'll see this year by a long chalk, I think it shows we are moving in the right direction, and we have got a very har working squad.

Re: vs. Toronto Wolfpack (Pre Season) : Sat Jan 27, 2018 8:52 pm  

Ferocious Aardvark wrote:

Unbelievable crowd for a pre-season friendly on a cold night with zero away support.

I was also pleasantly surprised at the relatively low scoreline. My only beef was our very poor and disorganised attack. When we did have possession in their half, too often the line was static and flat, and over and over again players were getting the ball stood still, and getting tackled before they had moved. As a result, we kept spilling the ball and losing yards.

Last plays were also very ropey, the best we had were crossfield kicks to the winger, but that just got the ball caught and then instant tackle. No kicks behind the line, no planned plays from kicks.

We were very considerably outmuscled, so it is great credit that they stuck at it and in fact in the last quarter forced a few dropouts.

I don't think halfbacks would have made much difference as we were defending most of the game.

All in all a goof hitout. We won't be meeting many Torontos in this league, and as that's the best team we'll see this year by a long chalk, I think it shows we are moving in the right direction, and we have got a very har working squad.

In his latest interview Kear said poor attack is his fault as all coaching so far has been on defence. Attack coaching starts tomorrow. He was very open about it.