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| New coach - Chris Chester |
On the back of a woefully inept and embarrassing performance
in the 28-0 defeat to Hull FC last night, in my mind the jury is still out on
whether Chris Chester is the right man to lead Hull Kingston Rovers forward.
Whilst the recent performance at home to champions Wigan was
a massive improvement after the dire performances at Widnes and the previous
home game against Salford, last night’s performance was the worst of a very poor
season.
Rovers were outplayed in every department. Hull were more
aggressive in defence and looked dangerous in attack every time they had the
ball. On the opposite side, Rovers missed tackles and dropped balls all night
long and never looked like scoring a try.
Allowing for the very wet conditions cannot question the fact that FC out
enthused Rovers and simply wanted to win the game more than we did.
A record of 2 wins from 7 games, one of which was against
bottom placed London Broncos, does not signal a massive upturn in performances
since Chairman Neil Hudgell decided to remove Craig Sandercock from the
coaching position just prior to the result of the season – a 40-10 home win
against league leaders St. Helens on 6th July.
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| Ex coach Craig Sandercock |
The following week resulted in a second half cave in against
Leeds Rhinos before the very poor display at home to Salford Red Devils – a
game in which we gifted the points to Salford with errors from 3 kicks costing
us 18 points in an 18-38 defeat.
The win against London the following week was very welcome
and Rovers played some good rugby but we could not follow that up in a pressure
situation at the Widnes Vikings which was a must win game if we were to have
any chance of making the play off’s – again a poor second half display,
something that Chester has continually harped on about, cost us two very
important points.Overall, 2014 has been a tough year for Hull Kingston Rovers.
An 8th place finish in 2013 was expected to be
improved upon as the squad was overhauled for the second year in a row.
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| Michael Weyman |
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| Neville Costigan |
Although star playmaker Michael Dobson was lost to the NRL, former
State of Origin forwards Michael Weyman and Neville Costigan were brought in from
the NRL with Justin Poore signing from Wakefield Trinity Wildcats along with
Grand Final winning scrum half Kris Keating from Canterbury Bulldogs to replace
Dobson.
Added to these new signings was the return of the iconic Ben
Cockayne from Wakefield and the addition of more forward strength with Jonny
Walker joining his twin brother Adam, the experienced Jamie Langley joining
from Bradford Bulls with French international Kevin Larroyer signing a 12 month
loan deal from Catalans Dragons.
The fixture list for the start of the new season was tough
with 4 of the first 5 fixtures against 4 of last season’s top 5 teams – Leeds at home and Huddersfield, St. Helen’s
and Wigan away – it was clear that the new team would have to gel quickly to
get off to a good start.
An opening round loss at home to Leeds Rhinos, in front of an
11,500+ crowd, was no disgrace – although conceding 28 unanswered point in the
second half was concerning.
An unexpected second round draw at 2013 League Leaders
Huddersfield, after trailing by 12 points with just a few minutes remaining,
was encouraging but this was followed by consecutive defeats at home to Castleford
Tigers and away at St. Helens and Wigan Warriors.
Consecutive home wins against the struggling Bradford Bulls
and Wakefield Trinity Wildcats at last kick started the season and was followed
by an excellent win at Warrington Wolves and a late Craig Hall drop goal won
the first Derby of the season, 21-20, in a pulsating clash at the start of the
Easter Weekend. |
| Craig Hall winning drop goal |
The early season discipline of both Poore and Weyman was
frustrating with both receiving bans and preventing them from forming a
formidable front row trio with co-skipper Josh Hodgson as often as Sandercock
would have liked.
The second game of the Easter weekend, away at Catalans
Dragons, put paid to Poore’s season due to a broken knee cap – add in injury’s
to David Hodgson and Jonny Walker along with slow start’s to the year from new
signings Keating and Costigan and the poor form of full back Greg Eden, sent on
loan to Salford Red Devils immediately after the Catalans game, and it was clear
that a tough year was on the cards.
The early season form of Omari Caro, Josh Hodgson, Travis
Burns, Kevin Larroyer and Michael Weyman were all positives and with Cockayne replacing Eden at
full back we now had an extra attacking weapon and a much stronger defender at
the back.
Unfortunately, consistency has been a key missing ingredient
from this season and indeed from the whole of the Sandercock era and we
struggled to build on the foundations of the 4 successive league wins with the
defeat at Catalans being followed by a disappointing late defeat at home to
Widnes Vikings and a draw away at struggling Salford Red Devils.The second Derby of the season came at the right time and a morale boosting 38-24 defeat of our local rivals at the Magic Weekend should have catapulted the season forward.
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| Cockayne injured at Magic |
Instead we lost Ben Cockayne, who had been outstanding at full back, for 10 weeks and lost 2 players, Wayne Ulugia and Jonny Walker due to repeated breaches of the club’s disciplinary code whilst Adam Walker and Greg Eden were also dropped for one match each because of poor discipline.
Add in the removal of Sandercock at the beginning of July, a
run of 4 wins in 12 league games (3 of them against relegated London and
Bradford), poor displays against Castleford, Warrington, Salford and Widnes,
strong performances against Leeds (the first 65 minutes anyway), Huddersfield
and Wigan and the performance of the season against St. Helens and you have the
story of an unfulfilled, disappointing, ill-disciplined and inconsistent
campaign.
All of the above bring’s us to where we currently stand – after
last night’s defeat and the Widnes victory over Wigan, we cannot make the play
off’s, we need to replace our 2 captains and best players Josh Hodgson and
Travis Burns who will be plying their trade in Canberra and St. Helens (still
to be confirmed but highly likely) next year and with a coach who has a
multitude of problem’s to solve if he is to prove himself the right man to take
the helm and warrant his new contract.
I can only wonder what Darrel Goulding is thinking – the
recently signed centre from current champions Wigan Warriors is a quality
player – but will have been expecting to play outside Travis Burns, following
Josh Hodgson’s line breaks and being coached by Craig Sandercock – none of that
will now happen. |
| Darrell Goulding |
Goulding is an outstanding acquisition, as is Kieran Dixon
from London Broncos – a player who has more ability than Omari Caro and who was
rated higher than Mason Caton-Brown before a devastating knee injury removed
him from the game for the best part of 12 months until recently – Ken Sio,
signed from Parramatta and having scored 34 tries in 54 first grade appearances
in the NRL, looks as though he could become a firm favourite at the KC
Lightstream Stadium whilst young gun James Donaldson from Bradford Bulls will
be a solid player for the team as will former Warrington forward Tyrone
McCarthy.
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| Josh Mantellato |
The unknown new signing is Josh Mantellato from the
Newcastle Knights – having played most of his career in reserve grade, with
only 2 NRL appearances to his name, he is an Italian international winger or
full back who has been a prolific try and point scorer in the lower grades – it
will be interesting to see if he can transfer his skills to Super League
successfully.
With local born players Liam Salter, James Green and Jordan
Cox continuing their improvement in 2015, the club will be looking to the likes
of Aaron Ollett, Sonny Esslemont, Conor Robinson, Macauley Hallett and Josh
Gudzek to take on the mantel and increase the number of academy graduates
making the step up to Super League.
However, the announcements are yet to be made about the main
positions that will have the greatest influence on how Hull Kingston Rovers
perform in 2015 – namely, who will replace our co-captains Hodgson and Burns –
both players have performed brilliantly for the club and it is these 2
positions along with the new Head Coach Chester that will ultimately influence
whether Hull Kingston Rovers contest the top eight play off’s in 2015 or will
be competing with 3 Super League clubs and 4 Championship clubs for the right
to maintain their Super League status in 2016.
Before last night there was only one positive to take from
2014 - Hull FC had been even worse than us – but after the embarrassing result
last night it is clear that Chester has a whole host of serious problems that
he need’s to solve before the start of next season.
Good luck Chris and I hope you prove me wrong. --------------------------------------------
Hull KR lost their final home league match against Catalans before ending the season with a confident win at Wakefield Trinity Wildcats.
Since the end of the season Rovers have confirmed the release of high profile signing Kris Keating, Neville Costigan resigned after deciding to stay in Australia, Omari Caro was not offered a new contract and Greg Eden left the club to sign for the Brisbane Broncos in the NRL.
On a positive note they have recruited Maurice Blair and Albert Kelly from the Gold Coast Titans, Ryan Bailey from Leeds Rhinos, Greg Burke from Wigan Warriors and are set to announce further signings in the near future.
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