I think it is about what's happening at the end of a set - and that's affected by what's happening in the build up; we're just not laying a platform by making solid metres in the early part of a set, so we're clawing back some of those metres in the middle part, and subsequently scrambling for a finish, rather than executing a set move from a strong position.

Analyse it all you like, but our ability to execute on-field has been directly and self-evidently undermined by the loss of some of our best players to long-term injury; no team copes well with that, least of all us, with relatively limited strength in depth - and that's not in any way to diminish the efforts of Kershaw, Croft etc - but they're just not first team players yet, with good reason.

It holds true for defence too - the team is disrupted, uncertain, and lacking fluency and confidence in each other - and as such, the defensive structure we were lauding early season, has fallen apart.

John Kear can't fix this - only medicine and time can.