***Rugby League in 2022***

JRS

JRS

JRS

Soldato
Joined
6 Jun 2004
Posts
19,704
Location
Burton-on-Trent
Super League XXVII is rapidly approaching. So, the usual starter:

1) Your team? Catalans Dragons.
2) Your highlight of last season? The Magic Weekend win to take the regular season crown, the way we came back to win that match was simply insane.
3) Your expectations this season? Not going to reach the highs of last season IMO, but we've proven that we can hang with the biggest teams.
4) Your most anticipated new signings? Mitchell Pearce, really looking forward to seeing what he can do for us.
5) Who you think will win the league leaders shield? St Helens.
6) Who will be the dark horses of the competition? I'd still like to see Huddersfield get their **** together.
7) Likely starting line-up? Ask me again after the friendly against Toulouse on the 29th
8) Final league position of your club? 3rd.
9) What (or who) will be your clubs weakness next year? Travel, ****-housery from the referees.
10) Who promoted from Championship? Probably Fev.

Covid is still hanging over the season right now. I was 'amused' (read: mildly hacked off :p) to read the BS from the Wakefield exec about how French travel and playing rules re: vaccination were going to make the season unfair. A couple things there my guy:

1) just get your damned players vaccinated or sack the buggers. All of the Dragons playing and coaching staff are vax'd. If they can get their **** together in the notoriously anti-vax, anti-authority, anti-whatever-you-got Catalonia then the other teams really ought to be able to!
2) maybe get your own house in order before whinging about France.
 
1) Your team? Wigan.
2) Your highlight of last season? It coming to an end :).
3) Your expectations this season? Anything will be better than last season's aimless drivel tbh.
4) Your most anticipated new signings? Cade Cust.
5) Who you think will win the league leaders shield? St Helens.
6) Who will be the dark horses of the competition? Hardly dark horses, but Leeds look to have recuited well.
7) Likely starting line-up? Depends on when/if Bevan French returns, but likely to be Field/French, Marshall, Hardaker, Thornley, Bibby, Smith, Cust, Mago, Powell, Ellis, Isa, Farrell, Bateman
8) Final league position of your club? Top 5 (hopefully)
9) What (or who) will be your clubs weakness next year? Depends entirely on how Cust shapes up and whether French returns (in any sort of form). Been lack of oomph up front for a few years, so interesting to see how that works out
10) Who promoted from Championship? Leigh - I think Toulose are nailed on to go down with the news of their player defections

Just want the season to start.
 
Which explains this season's replica shirts having no sponsors. I'd never heard of the company before. Interesting to see who they pick up as main sponsors. 4 of their first 6 games are on Sky. It can't be that hard to sell sponsorship for a 'big' name club surely. Probably end up with Mushy Peas or some other northern stereotype :rolleyes:
 
TonyM19 said:
Which explains this season's replica shirts having no sponsors. I'd never heard of the company before. Interesting to see who they pick up as main sponsors. 4 of their first 6 games are on Sky. It can't be that hard to sell sponsorship for a 'big' name club surely. Probably end up with Mushy Peas or some other northern stereotype :rolleyes:
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Openexchange are the new main sponsor for Wigan - I haven't heard of them either. At least its not John's Chippy from Norley Hall
 
St Helens - Catalans tonight. Excitement level high.

*sees the referee is the same one who screwed us in the Grand Final*

Okay, excitement just slipped a notch back towards apprehension...but, new season new chances.

The squad:


No Arthur Morgue, ankle injury :( He's going to be out for another couple of months.

Saints squad - Welsby, Makinson, Hopoate, Percival, Lomax, Dodd, Walmsley, Roby, Lees, Mata'utia, Batchelor, Knowles, Lussick, McCarthy-Scarsbrook, Sironen, Paasi, Amor, Wingfield, Simm, Davies, Hurrell.
 
Welp, Liam Moore set the tone for that one again almost straight away. But in truth Saints were much better than us for a lot of the match and deservedly ran out as winners.

We showed some glimpses of good things to come though. Just need to get some discipline back. Let's see what happens at Brutus on the 19th.

***edit***

FFS :mad::rolleyes:

 
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1) Your team? Hull KR
2) Your highlight of last season? Warrington away in the playoffs and beating them 0-19, amazing stuff.
3) Your expectations this season? Who the hell knows. Could be top 5...could be bottom 5...hard to tell just yet but I'm optimistic.
4) Your most anticipated new signings? I suppose you can't really look any further than Coote, but Minichella will feel like a new signing once he's fit to play.
5) Who you think will win the league leaders shield? St Helens.
6) Who will be the dark horses of the competition? Leeds
7) Likely starting line-up?

Coote
Wood
Takairangi
SKD
Hall
Lewis
Abdull
Vete
Parcel
King
Hadley
Linnett
Storton

Litten
Garratt
Sims
Richards

8) Final league position of your club? 5th, why not?
9) What (or who) will be your clubs weakness next year? Possible speed, strength and player availability towards the play-offs (assuming we get in them!). Last year Catalans were just too big, too strong and too powerful in that playoff game.
10) Who promoted from Championship? No idea, but want it to be York (it won't be).

Church tonight! Lets see how it goes! COYR! Got my east stand ticket!
 
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Wigan looked ok on Friday. HKR did a lot of the hard work for them tbh. They looked a little bit like Wigan did for most of last season, ie a bit rudderless. I felt for the young winger, but wondered why he wasn't getting bombs down his throat for the rest of the evening. HKR beat Wigan comfortably twice last season, so that's the yardstick to measure this against

Wigan look like they have pace throughout their backline, with French to come back into it. The pack looked better than last season and were comng onto flat balls from dummy half at pace. Unlike last season when they were getting the ball stood still with defenders on top of them. Largely the same players, but a new coach. There's a hooker who didn't start on Friday (scored for Newcastle on dual reg though) called Brad O'Neil. He is one to watch. Reminds me of a young McIlorum (or Terry Newton if you are that old :)). Likey to know his way to discliplinary meetings though!

Vete looked a handful for HKR. I wondered why they put the tackle on Thornley on report, but looking back at it he might be in bother. Isa got a ban for a similar tackle last year (I think they called it a 'knee drop')

James Child was James Child - equally bewildering for both teams

Sts looked really good. Their pack was outstanding. I think the ref could have a) kept them further apart b) tidied up the ruck. Same for both teams, but played more into Sts gameplan. The set where they kept Cataln in their own 15m was hardly surpising as they were about 8m back and still offside. Dylan Napa was a bundle of aggression all night. He plays close to the edge and he is going to stray over it quite often. Bentley at Leeds being another one, Partington at Wigan, every team has one - Mike Gregory said that you won't win a league without one of that type of player, but you won't win anythng with more than one. He played in a pack with Sorenson, Tamati and Roach so he should know I suppose
 
TonyM19 said:
Wigan looked ok on Friday. HKR did a lot of the hard work for them tbh. They looked a little bit like Wigan did for most of last season, ie a bit rudderless. I felt for the young winger, but wondered why he wasn't getting bombs down his throat for the rest of the evening. HKR beat Wigan comfortably twice last season, so that's the yardstick to measure this against
Click to expand...

Disappointed a bit with that Rovers performance, it wasn't all that bad, all told, and as you said above, we laid tries up on a plate which let the scoreline run out a bit which was a shame. Felt we were more than a match for Wigan in the forwards, if not dominated, just sloppy mistakes and lapses of concentration probably the difference.

Bit abject last week, wondering where the side that played so well last year was.

Then last night was a solid but unspectacular performance where we turned up the intensity a bit in the second half and strode away comfortable winners and nice to see Sam Wood getting MOTM and scoring a few tries to relieve the pressure from his costly dropped balls against Wigan.

Cas looked just very plain - dare I say it a bit Radford-y? Coupled with what seemed like a load of their own fans fighting each other in the second half must have made for a very miserable away day. If we had Sims and Vete out last night then we beat them by 10 more points.
 
Cas have made a worrying start to the year. There's no pressure on them for relegation with Toulouse losing their best players before a ball was kicked.

Glad that Wood had a good game. Must have been a nightmare v Wigan

Wigan looked ok against Huddersfield. Mago didn't look as spectacular and it looked like a team had actually done a bit of homework on Field, but they got the win. Leulauai had a great game. Two trips to France in a fortnight coming up - Catalan being the acid test
 
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