Bilko wrote:You have to bare in mind that last years 4th place finish came despite a stinking fixture list that saw 10 of our 27 games coming against the eventual top 3! No one came close to a tough a fixture list as that. Catalans in return had a miles easier fixture list. Had it been an even list I've no doubt we'd have finished 3rd above them and I think the play offs proved that.
This year it's not so tough so we should be expecting to do much better or as good as despite the absence of Barrett in my opinion. But we seem stuck in a void of a win 3 lose 3 pattern this season and until we improve that to at least win 4 lose 2 from every 6 games we can only hope to scrape into the top 8.
You are forgetting Warrington conveniently moved aside and handed 4th on a plate to us. I forget how many games they lost at the back end of last season but their tail off in form was spectacular.
Also while our fixtures may have got easier the rest of the teams fixtures have not got any harder and we still have to make up the 4 points down we are from this time last season to finish with the same points total.
If we do manage that, a lot will depend on how the teams above us go and we can't rely on another team "doing a Wire" and imploding towards the end of the league campaign.
So we are already in a situation IMO that to match least season we can afford very few further losses. We lost 11 in total last time so only have 4 more losses to play with (though we did draw 3 games). We play Saints twice and Leeds once more I think so I think we will do very well to finish with 11 losses again.
Dave