Hangerman2 wrote:Same old story, what you will find as in previous seasons is when the players start coming back morale is shot so we keep on losing.
I'm sorry but we accept garbage far too easily at Huddersfield. I've waited to post for a few days because i was absolutely fuming at the guff we served up on Friday night. First game of the seasons, AT HOME, against a side most tip to be in the bottom 2 and we were absolutely shocking. We were nowhere near winning that game, and although we had injuries there is absolutely no excuse for :
1) Shocking line speed in defence
2) Barely managing to get out of our 20 without a penalty
3) Getting dominated in every aspect of the game
When i saw team sheet i was worried that Farrell would be terrible like last time he played, but he fully deserved man of the match. They targetted him all night in defence and he stepped up to the mark, and had some really nice touches in attack too, saw him in a new light. Frawley is not the organiser we were hoping for, but , you can see that he is a very dangerous line runner, and if we knew how to back up would have scored at least one tries from his breaks (he was the only one who made one all night)
There is no excuse for our established players (many of whom have been spouting on the website about how much they are looking forward to 'ripping in') for producing such an utterly lacklustre display AT HOME in the first game of the season. No go forward at all, and slow, plodding , wait for the attack to make a play defence. It was utterly shocking and they should be embarrassed to wear the shirt.
I always look at the defensive line speed first and foremost.
If it's good it means you are -
Dominating the ruck and are able to set your line before the oppo has time to play the ball.
Showing intent.
Showing energy.
Showing confidence (in yourself and those around you).
Showing confidence in your defensive structures.
There were lots of people calling for offside against Salford but the reality was that their line speed was so much better than ours that our fans could only get their head round it by seeing Salford as constantly offside. Our play the balls were so slow that by the times we looked up Salford were in our faces.
Salfords first 2 tries were well worked but by the time they got near our line they virtually just had to flop over it as our defence had backtracked so much.
To say the onus this season is to build on our defence we are miles away.
As you say, a lot of 'best pre season yet' stuff but it all depends on how well the other 11 teams pre-seasons have gone in relation to your.
Looks like Salfords has gone better than ours!
TBF though the loss of key players in the lead up to the game must have disrupted us but there was no excuse for some of the defence we had on show.
Lots for the coaches to think about this week and an early season wake up call.
