fevnut's musings #13: What is wrong?

fevnut's musings

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At Swinton on March 17th we got our first away win. But quite frankly it wasn’t good. Against a team who had lost all their previous seven matches we put up a poor show and compounded that by getting three players sin-binned.

But we were reasonably confident that an honest analysis of the win would lead to a reaction leading to a much better and more disciplined performance in our next game. How wrong we were!

Dewsbury

A week passed and we arrived at the LD Nutrition stadium confident, only to be served up a really lack-lustre effort. Some people have tried to put the blame on the referee. Absolute nonsense - we were beaten by a team that were far superior on the day.

What was the difference?

Much had been made of how the Dewsbury team was packed full of former Fev players who would be out to prove a point. Well, if that was in their minds (and frankly we doubt it) it just might have spurred them on to putting in extra effort, but it wouldn’t have allowed them to dominate the match.

As we saw it, the factors that made the difference were rugby intelligence and leadership. They were to be seen in abundance from Liam Finn and Paul Sykes who completely controlled the game. The way they controlled the game and the Dewsbury team was precisely what we were lacking.

Leadership

You can have a coach who produces a great game plan but unless you have the players on the field to organise play and ensure the game plan is executed a game plan is of no use.

As Fev fans we have been used to having really good organisers. We don’t have to go back far. Three prime examples are Stuart Dickens, Tim Spears and, of course, Liam Finn. When they were around it would have been unimaginable that our players would not have been organised, each doing their own job and linking effectively with one another. When they were around, when the opposition scored there was always animated talk behind the posts whilst the conversion was being taken.

It looked as though that was really lacking against Dewsbury and in most of our matches this season as well.

A coach organises the team during training, makes decisions about interchanges and sends out messages to his team. But a successful team needs an on-field leader as well. Someone has to step up to the mark and really get to grips with that role or there will be more poor displays like the ones we have seen in the past fortnight.

Making the best of our talents

In the backs we have players who can produce fantastic attacking rugby. In particular Luke Briscoe and Harry Newman. Last week they were almost completely starved of the opportunities to use their talent. There was one great move that resulted in Luke’s try but for most of the match they were starved of any decent passes. It almost felt as if we were trying to play a match with 13 forwards and it didn’t work.

Negativity?

You may think this week we have been very negative. It’s not meant that way. We have a squad of good players but the performances over the last fortnight have been well short of their capabilities. It’s what happens when you have so many new players and is not helped by the continual chopping and changing brought about by dual registration and loans. A situation that cries out even more than usual for someone to take charge on the field. Blips happen but what the fans need is to see that we are learning from them. Come on, get a grip!