17
Heroes
We couldn’t
get down to London for the match last week but we listened to the commentary on
FevTV and found it hard to believe what we were hearing.
We had
hoped (rather than expected) a Fev win but who could possibly have predicted
that we would find ourselves 34-0 up going to the last ten minutes. What a pity
that we let in two tries at the end but to have nilled them would have just
been an extra layer of icing on a massive quality cake.
We then watched
it when it became available on FevTV and that was by far and away the best
viewing of the week. It was impossible to pick out a man of the match. We
thought that Jouffret and McLelland were great in the halves, but so were James
Harrison, Craig Hall, Brett Ferres …. In fact the list could well include all
17 Fev players!
It gives us
so much hope for this season, especially after that dire game against Barrow
which left us feeling pretty low.
Let’s hope
that we can keep up last week's level in the coming games. We certainly should beat
Swinton on Sunday although we suspect that they themselves will be hugely
improved since we beat them 66-16 last August. Then comes Hunslet on the
following Friday night in the Challenge Cup.
The next really
big test of how we are going is at the end of the month when we play Leigh
Centurions who are also unbeaten at the moment. We are really excited about
that one.
The Half Back conundrum
Of course
it’s good to have three quality halfbacks potentially available in Dane
Chisholm, Louis Jouffret and Callum McLelland. But the question is that when
they are all fit, and Leeds are willing to let us have McLelland on dual reg,
who do you play?
We have no
doubt that McLelland is a great young player and has the potential to become
one of the finest halfbacks in the country. But he will never be a Fev
registered player because we suspect that if Leeds were ever mad enough to let
him go he would be snapped up by another Super League club. I suppose the only
chance we would ever have is if we get into Super League and he becomes
available.
We got to
thinking about all the great halfback pairings Fev have had over the years.
Lots of great individuals but the real spark comes when you have a scrum-half
and a stand-off who play well together. It’s the pairing that lays the
foundation for the potential of a team.
Many clubs
over the years have had two fine individuals but the pairing of the two
together has not worked. It is a partnership that needs to be developed and it
is sometimes in the nature of a quality halfback that they are magnificent
individually but find it difficult to work as one half of a partnership. It
can, occasionally work, where one partner is dominant but it is rarely as good
as when they are a combination of equals.
Arguably the
greatest halfback pairing in Fev’s history was Don Fox and Joe Mullaney. Two
great individuals but their partnership was what made them stand out and they
knew each other inside out, an understanding forged over time with them playing
no less than 215 times together in the halves for Fev.
Who to play
at the moment comes down to taking a short or long term view. If you look
simply on a match by match basis then, when available, you would have to pick
McLelland. But if you take the longer term view of building a team then the
development of the partnership between Jouffret and Chisholm seems to us to
make more sense. If one is injured or suspended then it is fantastic to have
the possibility of playing McLelland but the fact is that he won’t be available
all the time. He won’t figure for us in the Challenge Cup and critically he
might not be available when we get to the Championship run-in and the play-offs.
We need to
think about what is best for the end of this season (and seasons to come) and
build towards that. For us, that means giving Jouffret and Chisholm as much
time as possible playing together.
Injury
Update (needed)
A few weeks
ago RoversTV did a good interview with Greg Stebbings in which he discussed the
injury situation amongst the Fev squad. That was really good but may w make a
plea that this becomes a regular feature, at least on a monthly basis. Fev fans
deserve to be kept up to date on how injured players are progressing.
Corey
Johnson
We see that Leeds youngster
and former England Academy player, Corey Johnson, has decided to retire. At the
age of 19!! The reports say that he wants to focus on his life away from the
sport. It’s sad that he feels that way and potentially a blow to Fev. He played
a couple of games, on dual reg, for us last year and, as a hooker, he was
potentially a player who could have been useful in a position that seems to be
the most threadbare in our current squad.
We wish him well and hope
that he feels able to return to playing in the future.
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