Yorkshire’s finest have developed an uncanny knack of building up the supporters’ hopes with stirling passages of play both in attack and defence only to dash them with silly errors, strange decisions & tactics or just plain bad luck. The home fixture against Sale had all these ingredients. The Carnegies set off at a pace and had Sale on the back foot for twenty minutes. Pressure was converted into points and a win was on the cards. Inexplicably the lads changed tactics and spent the rest of the game kicking their hard earned possession back to the Sharks. Sale realised that the Leeds strategy had  gone skew-whiff and did not kick to touch after that , knowing full well that they were going to get the ball straight back. The result was entirely predictable – another home defeat, snatched from the jaws of victory.

Since then Leeds has had two narrow defeats, at Wasps and at home to London Irish. Both these games could have been won but were not and now the magnitude of the task is that much greater. The club only has two league fixtures this month and two wins would be most welcome. Has anything changed since the last time we played Sharks back in  December? In one respect the answer is no, we are still at the foot of the table. However those of us with an unjaundiced eye have noticed that the team is playing much better of late. The passages of good play get longer, the mistakes fewer & the bad luck is still bad luck. I get the feeling, especially from watching the LI game, that a couple of slices of good luck will change the season completely. Add to this the timely news that all our long term absentees are available to play again – as Lanny says it is like signing four new players. Competition for places is greater than ever, at a time when other GP teams are having to lose players to the Six Nations. Hendrie Fourie has only played twenty or so minutes of rugby this season, Mark Lock has got no time in at all.

I am sure that the team that takes to the field on Friday night will give its all to the cause. If the lesson from the December game has been learnt then the lads will go at Sale from the off and keep them on the back foot. If it hasn’t then the prospect of a trip to the South Yorkshire paddy fields looms large for next season. Aaaargh!......

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