Anyone recall the last game at the Willows and the damage Menzies did to us? Quite a relief he's out - pretty much the same for Sa & Greenshields too - whilst we'll clearly miss Williams & Broughton I think Nero & Gleeson did a pretty good job for us



Allez les Diables Rouges

We'll miss Williams and Broughton's strong running from dummy half to get us on the front foot in the first couple of tackles brining it away from our line. We struggle there enough as it is. Gleeson and Nero will do a decent job for us but they haven't got the speed from standing or the finishing ability of them two and Gibson. We'll certainly miss them more than we did against London.



We'll be less creative with Wild or Anderson at centre and I still worry about the way Vinnie switches off in defence (although he has a decent off load which will be good for Gleeson if he plays there)



That said we've probably had worse first choice 3/4 lines in the past than this patched up one and Holdsworth and Patten in particular have been timing their runs into the centre position so well that it won't be the problem it could have been.



I thought one of the U20s might be asked to step up - a few of them have been scoring tries for fun. Maybe they're not quite ready yet

Can Josh Vievers play on the wing with Gleeson or Nero as his centre?

Yes

I thought Wild looked good in the centre last week, made same telling breaks. I'd go with Ave It's team above

If you think our normal forwards are big you ain't seen nothin' yet! Bousquet (in the 19) weighs in at 1m93cms and 117kgs whereas Paea is a mere 1m84cms and 104kgs.



He is young and very mobile!

And Stacul, Vaccari and Pelissier!! Looks like I'll be playing myself!

Probably getting a little ahead of myself here, but when (if ever) did we last win four on the bounce in Super League?

Definitely getting ahead of yourself!!!



Did we win the opening 4 or 5 under Andy Greg in our first year in Super League??? Or was it 4 of the first 5 or something?



Edit - just checked - we won 5 of the opening 6 including a 4 match winning sequence in 1997. Not sure whether we've done it since



It brought back some memories checking that out - Our first game in SL was a high scoring 4-0 against Cas, we then had a narrow loss away at Saints (was that the one where we felt we should have had a penalty try for Sini being taken out chasing a kick through??). We then beat Oldham at home, Halifax away, Paris St Germain at home and Sheffield at home. Is it fate that there's a French team and the bottom two sides in that run??



We also beat Wigan home and away that season and Saints and Warrington at home, had a narrow home defeat to Leeds and were well beaten home and away by the eventual champions Bradford and the mighty London Broncos (runners up).



We finished 6th out of 12. It was pre-play off days and we got to the second round of the premiership (beating PSG in what I think was their last competitive game - if you can call a 48-6 defeat competitive!) where we lost away at Saints with "a young Sean Long" scoring 2 tries and kicking 3 goals deputising for the suspended Bobbie Goulding. More fate???



I remember it all well, one of my favourite ever seasons. One like that this year would do for me

Anybody heard any team news at all yet and does anybody know anyone who will be giving updates from game via Twitter/FB etc? Cheers

6-4 up. Howarth for us. Blanch for them.

Tommy Bosc try. 14-6