Re: What now? : Wed Sep 01, 2021 9:15 pm  

I’d swap Sims for a bag of Haribos.

One of those little bags, not the sharing ones.

Re: What now? : Wed Sep 01, 2021 9:28 pm  

mwindass wrote:

Think we can all admit that something is wrong with the 'culture' at the club at the moment. When the going get tough, the players get going. We folded at crucial times in 2018, 2019, 2020 as well as this season.

I'd look at what Steve McNamara has done at Cats and hope we can replicate it. He's got rid of the dead wood and bad attitudes and turned them around over 4/5 years. Admittedly the star signings like Maloney and Tomkins have helped, but they've got some grafters like Mcillorum, Dudson, Whitley etc. and are seeing the benefits now.

How much money can/will AP invest is the question

Mcnamara has done a great job, I'd also add that Catalans young players look exciting, Morgue is unpredictable whereas a lot of FC youngsters in recent years just drive the ball up and become squad players.

Catalans also seem to have done something to fix their previously woeful away form, whereas we badly need the key to playing well at the MKM.

Re: What now? : Wed Sep 01, 2021 9:33 pm  

Rocknrolla69er wrote:

Wonder if the 2 new directors, was it 2? Bring some much needed investment.

What solves the "culture" problem?

Under Radford we had poor discipline and weak mentality/poor professionalism whereas we threw the towel in when things didn't go our way.

Seems we've reverted back to type, I'm sure Hodgson will identify any weeds in the garden and root them out, I like the way he composed his after match interviews, made it clear the weak mentality/poor professionalism wouldn't be tolerated.

Culture is a difficult thing to change in any organisation, I'd question why we've employed so many ex-players over the years, were Horne, Yeaman, Feka, Ellis etc really the best at interview or where they just cheap and available? Ellis aside most of them haven't played anywhere else and seen anything different to the HullFC way. Tho I do appreciate its hard to lure people to this end of the M62.

I'd also question what Purcell has brought to the club, Radford seemed to freeze him out but he's been back in the 'warmth' for a while now, but I'm still not clear what aspect of our coaching he does. Without being there on the Training field its hard to judge how the backroom staff perform but we've now switched from Radford, to Last to Hodgson with little to no change so maybe it isn't just the head coach.

Re: What now? : Thu Sep 02, 2021 1:12 am  

tommyfromhull wrote:

Really don’t see us offloading any of them. And even if we do, who will replace them? They would need to be English and obviously better to make it worthwhile. Can’t think of anyone.

Catalans had a fair few, but why would they leave? Namely these:
Jason Baitieri, Alrix Da Costa, Josh Drinkwater, Benjamin Garcia, Mickael Goudemand, Benjamin Jullien, Sam Kasiano, Samisoni Langi, James Maloney

Scrub Jimmy Maloney- a couple of weeks ago he announced he was retiring at the end of the season and returning to Aus.

Re: What now? : Thu Sep 02, 2021 5:24 am  

Freddie Miller. wrote:

Scrub Jimmy Maloney- a couple of weeks ago he announced he was retiring at the end of the season and returning to Aus.

Changed his mind shortly afterwards and has now signed for FC Lezignan in France's Elite One Championship. He'll be playing with Sam Moa.

Re: What now? : Thu Sep 02, 2021 12:35 pm  

Catalans have had a great season, however they have sonevwell with injuries, look at their squad for the weekend, what other team has 1 to 12 available and they also have the Tompkins brothers and Kasiano available who had later squad numbers.

Injuries are so key

Re: What now? : Thu Sep 02, 2021 2:49 pm  

tommyfromhull wrote:

Really don’t see us offloading any of them. And even if we do, who will replace them? They would need to be English and obviously better to make it worthwhile. Can’t think of anyone!

I am hoping at least one new overseas player, and all season I was hoping this would be another prop but for me hooker has to be priority now. Johnstone, for all he looked alright when he first joined us under Last, hasn’t kicked in at all and seems to be playing bit part roles now. Houghton as a spell hooker for a newbie would be preferable I think.

At a quick look, these are players in SL who were OOC in June who are in positions we need. Almost all of them I would question why they would want to leave their club to come to us!:
Tui Lolohea
Adam Milner
Dec Patton
Darcy Lussick

Catalans had a fair few, but why would they leave? Namely these:
Jason Baitieri, Alrix Da Costa, Josh Drinkwater, Benjamin Garcia, Mickael Goudemand, Benjamin Jullien, Sam Kasiano, Samisoni Langi, James Maloney

Ask our ex Head Coach , if he'd swap Evalds & McShane, for Sneyd & Shaul/Houghton
Move Connor to 7, Evalds to 1, McShane at 9..
Also, replace the fitness & conditioning team, freshen the joint up..
Job done

Re: What now? : Thu Sep 02, 2021 3:57 pm  

Dave K. wrote:

Catalans have had a great season, however they have sonevwell with injuries, look at their squad for the weekend, what other team has 1 to 12 available and they also have the Tompkins brothers and Kasiano available who had later squad numbers.

Injuries are so key

Absolutely - see us in 2016. We had a good squad who stayed fit. The only long term injury was Jack Logan and that meant Yeaman became the regular centre. We played 35 games that season, Taylor and Houghton played all but one, Sneyd and Bowden missed two each, Shaul, Watts and Washbrook all played 30+ games, Talanoa, Michaels, Manu, Fonua, Mini and Yeamo all played 28-29.

Re: What now? : Thu Sep 02, 2021 7:31 pm  

Once you go beyond our starting 17 players the size of our replacement forwards go drastically down.we have 3 forwards that are under 6 foot and only weighing between 13 to 15 and a half stone. In my opinion if you want to be in the top 4 you need bigger forwards. At times we have 2 small forwards on the field at once and we have no go forward ?

Re: What now? : Fri Sep 03, 2021 7:09 am  

TommoHFC wrote:

Once you go beyond our starting 17 players the size of our replacement forwards go drastically down.we have 3 forwards that are under 6 foot and only weighing between 13 to 15 and a half stone. In my opinion if you want to be in the top 4 you need bigger forwards. At times we have 2 small forwards on the field at once and we have no go forward ?

Forget the squad our strongest 17 isn't good enough and certainly not creative enough, our halfbacks and hookers have been poor, that's our biggest problem.

I'd love a couple more big forwards, but unless our pivots improve we will wont challenge.

I'm recruitment has to be on this area and not more props.