Patton will either be amazing or absolutely dreadful. Unfortunately Ant Walker is no longer a Viking.

Trips to Widnes have haunted us and before today we’d only won twice there since 2015. In a league where we've been hit and miss I'm happy we have banked the win and move on. Similar issues as most weeks. Not respecting the ball and losing possession in key areas. Armitage's offload in our own half with the game on the line in the second half was horrendous. We also seem to have these mental switch-off moments during games. Too often we lack focus in key areas. Widnes can't buy a win at the moment and threw a lot at us at times but we seemed to deal with the majority of it. Special Agent Dec Patton was up to his old tricks. He is clueless.


Some great individual efforts from Holmes, Hooley andd Okunbor (making up for his earlier errors). Potential banana skin avoided.

First half our defence was poor and we conceded some soft tries off the back of some lazy defending allowing Widnes good yardage. Woke up a little in the final 15 minutes but still blew some good position.


2nd half defence was much better and with some actual aggression. Still a few brainfarts that would see us punished against better opposition but we made it over the line. Part way through the first half I thought it was the Barrow game repeating itself and we would leave ourselves too much to do. The try just before HT was massive.


Plenty to work on but any win at this stage of the season is a good one even if it wasnt as comfortable as perhaps it could have been with a little more composure.

While the Team still has to work on defence & attack it keeps them motivated, so when the play offs are reached they can still step up, whereas York and possibly Toulouse are getting their wins a bit more comfortably, the step up of play off intensity may catch them out! 

We seen it been before in thegood old days!

Important win. Still far too many moments of completely switching off. But it was essential we won that game. That's probably first time we've been really up against it and come out on the right side of the score line. 


But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Widnes lost to 11 men last week and are down in 9th for a reason. Gutsy and determined, yes, but they lack any serious quality. Those brain farts would have been punished against York/Toulouse.  Good news is we look to have found out spine combination. Hopefully we can run with it until the end of the season and it should improve every week. 


Another tough game coming up against a team who would love nothing more than to end our top 2 challenge. 

The first 20 minutes, Bayliss, Mason and (hate to say it) Doro were all under par. Low energy, losing the collision. On came Michael, Scurr and Hallas, immediately fixed the energy/enthusiasm issue, started to make some yardage and restrict Widnes. But same issues again, errors, forcing the play. We shouldn’t be struggling with low energy or enthusiasm. 
Bayliss and Doro came on again with 15 or so minutes to go and played much better. 
Hallas and Scurr put in big minutes and really left all their energy out there. 


As above, the spine seems to be settled now.  Souter is a better hooker than Lilley and needs to start if he is fit now. 


But, another 2 points against a team that usually lifts themselves to beat us.