Hookers
Before we
say anything else, we want to make it clear that we have great admiration
for Jack Bussey and would always want to see him in the match day squad.
Hooker is a
highly specialist position. Above all it requires the player to have the
ability to move the ball swiftly from the play-ball and do so with speedy and accurate
passes to enable the recipient to make the most of any opportunities.
Those requirements
were lacking in the match against Swinton. We have watched the game very
carefully on Rovers TV and the movement of the ball, once heeled, was slow and
far too often the passes were neither accurate nor speedy. We don’t blame Jack.
We believe that he is simply being played in the wrong position.
What a far
cry it is from the situation last season when we had Cameron King and Connor
Jones to call upon. And going back a bit further we loved watching Andy Ellis,
Richard Chapman, Trevor Clark and Keith Bridges (to mention just a few) who
were specialist number nines. Each very different in their style but all with
the basic skills needed for an effective hooker.
We are
afraid that the lack of depth of specialist hookers in our 2020 squad is a
problem. It is a position that carries a very heavy workload and hence, in the
modern game it is usual to have a hooker on the bench. Dean Parata is our only
specialist hooker and there aren’t any amongst our youngsters as far as we can
see.
This
problem is compounded with the situation at Leeds. They have in their squad
Brad Dwyer, Kruise Leeming (currently injured). They started the year with a
third hooker in Corey Johnson who has played for Fev on dual reg but has now
decided to retire, so we can’t expect any help from there.
It seems to
us that the first priority for our squad is a permanent or loan signing of a
hooker.
Hunslet
We love the
Hunslet logo. It is so full of optimism and a reminder of what a great club
they have been.
Last week
we played Swinton who had achieved ‘The Four Cups’ in the 1927/28 season.
Hunslet were the first to do it back in 1907/08. Do you know who their captain
was then? You know his name - it was none other than Albert Goldthorpe.
Looking
back to the early days of the Northern Rugby League Hunslet were definitely the
top Leeds club. In the Yorkshire Senior Competition there were actually 5 out
of 16 that were from the Leeds area. Aside from Leeds and Hunslet there were
Leeds Parish Church, Bramley and Holbeck. That year Hunslet finished 4th with
the other Leeds clubs in 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th places.
There have been
two unfortunate circumstances that were major factors in the decline of this
famous club in an area that has produced so many great players.
First of
all was the decline of the heavy engineering industry for which the Hunslet
area was renowned. It was the source of players and spectators just like the col-mining
industry was for Fev. That downturn in heavy engineering led to the collapse of
the original Hunslet club in July 1973. They simply didn’t have a ground to
play on.
But ‘New
Hunslet’ took to the field in the following year. But, in 1999, they received
another devastating blow. Having won the NFP Grand Final they were refused
entry to Super League resulting in the loss of many players from their very
good team and also the disillusionment and subsequent loss of many supporters, with
their average home attendance dropping by 33%.
So, we say
that we admire the optimism in that logo and wish them well for the future,
albeit not in the Challenge Cup this year!
100,000
Last week ‘fevnut’s
blog’ passed the 100,000 views mark. Many thanks to all our readers. You make
it worthwhile putting in the effort required to keep it going. Many blogs are
run to make money. We don’t have or invite advertisers, it is done purely and
simply for the love of Featherstone Rovers and was started as the club moved
away from producing a matchday programme.
You will be
surprised to know where our readers come from. Aside from our ‘home’ readers,
we have recently had views coming from (amongst others) Canada, United States
(a surprisingly large number), France, Spain, Australia, Russia, New Zealand
and India. But the biggest surprise of all is that the blog has, in the last
couple of weeks, had 36 views from Turkmenistan. We would love to know who is
reading it from there!!
Brilliant read as usual, keep up the good work.
ReplyDelete