The tables upside down.

If you are a fan of Warrington Wolves this review will be a difficult read. If you are a fan of  another team, but love our great game of Rugby League this review will be a difficult read. At the start of the season the pundits, bookies and fans of the game had Warrington down along with Wigan as the team to beat. I subscribed to this and looking at our first three games was expecting at least four out of six points. 

These predictions have so far proven to be wrong, so it was with two losses from two that Warrington travelled to the AJ Bell stadium to take on the Salford Red Devils. To my mind a club of Warrington's aspirations and quality of squad should be beating Salford by a decent margin. Salford are not that great a team, yet they beat us by ten points! Now that we are 3 losses in and rooted to the bottom of the table I'm looking at our squad and wondering whats going wrong. Where is the team that so comprehensively beat Brisbane only 3 short weeks ago, yes we had Hill, Ratchford, Currie, Crosby, both Kings and Russell all missing but we had enough quality to have taken the points.

After 10 minutes today, I knew we were going to struggle. We lacked creativity, energy, cohesion, structure and worst of all team sprit. We played like 13 people whose only link and connection was that they were wearing the same colour jersey.  When we took the ball forward there was no backing up for the off load. Our whole game was disjointed with no fluidity and we regularly broke down on the 2nd or 3rd play. This was often due to handling errors or poor  execution. Our attacking line was flat and had no depth. It was as if the players were just standing in a line because thats what they had to do. Our attack was unstructured and classless and reminded me of the season after we lost Lee Briers. In that season we would get to the opposing 20 metre line and then look around saying "where's Lee? oh fuck he's not here what do we do next ". Our kicking game was average,  but not the reason we lost the game. However it does need highlighting that we kicked out on the full on three occasions giving Salford ball and territory. To add to this we gave away stupid penalties, giving Salford even more ball and territory.

This is grim reading I know but I'll continue. We did the basics poorly, our passing of the ball was atrocious and was to the knees or thighs of the receiving player. Accurate passing of the ball is a prerequisite of Rugby League. Our tackling was a slight improvement on our last game against Castleford, but crucially we were poor close to our line allowing Salford at least one 6 pointer due to poor technique and lack of determination to halt the attacker. For one try our defence just seemed to slacken off before the tackle was complete and called held. The Salford player just reached out and scored a try whilst our defence looked on in disbelief. I could go on and on and on writing how poor we were, but by now I know you guys get the gist. 

So why are we playing so poorly and sitting at the bottom of the table. What has happened to the team that three weeks ago beat the Brisbane Broncos and last season reached two major finals and won the League Leaders Shield? I think this years squad is stronger and has more depth the last season. Our only notable losses from 2016 were Dodds and Sandow. However their loss is negated by the fact that both were missing for much of the season. In the close season we added Cooper, Savelio, Crosby, Brown and upgraded Harvey Livett. All these are quality players. Our coaching team hasn't changed, neither has our strength and conditioning team. In summary, nothing noteworthy has happened and we haven't just become a bad team since last October.  

So what is it? Some on social media are suggesting that Tony Smith has had enough time and more than enough financial resources. To be fair these same voices, were, prior to the season starting predicting that we would not do well and Tony Smith was the reason. In addition these people were saying our backs are not up to standard and they were chosen and coached by Tony Smith. That is one school of thought and going off our nil from three and dreadful performances so far they do have a very fair point. 

However my current thoughts are different. I believe that we have just had a rotten, piss poor start to the season and we will come good and play to our potential. I know I am prone to seeing the world through Primrose and Blue coloured glasses but as I have said, our squad is stronger than last season and we haven't just become a bad team since last year October. Over the next couple of months our performances and place on the league table will clearly show who is correct. For the sake of our team and season I hope its me, not because I want to be right, but because if I'm wrong, then we're in for a bad season. 

Now for a few positives, Joe Westerman was again very good, his pass for one of our tries was sublime and a pleasure to watch. Cooper and Clark were good as they have been all our four games. Ashton Simms ran the ball in true and hard but I'm sorry to say thats it really. It was a very good turnout by the Warrington faithful and I'd say we outnumbered the Salford fans. 

One last point, prior to the game Jack Hughes was quoted as saying todays game against Salford was a must win game for us, I didn't and still don't think this was the case. However our next game is against Wigan Warriors and to stay in touch with the league leaders the Wigan game has now become a must win game.

Thanks for reading.

Salford Red Devils 24 - Warrington Wolves 14

Salford try scorers: Sa'u 2, Griffin and Brining.

Warrington try scorers : Patton, Hughes and Johnson.