341 The Dentist Diary

Potentially disastrous, hardly sensational, but adequate, effective and controlled and with 9 first choice players out, 2 more precious points!!!

With such a young team on show for the purist it was certainly a focused and committed performance as some of our younger charges showed maturity beyond their years. Gentle commented afterwards that he thought in training last week that his young guns were coming to the end of their run, so it was a good result. The fact is that late Broughton try, spectacular though it was, just skewed the score because for long, long periods, like against Catalans last week, it never looked like we would lose. Obviously Salford team were buoyed by the appointment of new Coach Noble and our enforced changes through injury could have seen us slip up, but the maturity of our young forwards was great to see and many in the home team were blowing for a tug before the end.

I have a bit to say in this week’s Diary about gates and the crisis that is unfolding at both ends of the Super League table and boy it was never more apparent as it was on Saturday at Salford. In their shiny new, small but none the less pretty impressive Stadium, Salford’s home gate (2000 estimated) was abysmal and it looked from where we sat, squashed into the end third of the East Stand, that we probably outnumbered the home fans.

The good Doctor and Brian Noble certainly have a deal to do to get the crowds back, but for us it was job done and the record shows two points gained, although believe me, we will have to be in a lot better form than that to do anything at all against Wigan in two weeks time. At present each week it’s about facing the issues and the injuries etc. and doing what is necessary to win and get two points.

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As we sat in the garden and ate our lunch on Saturday, in that rarest of commodities warm sunshine, my mind went back to what I said last week, in that as diehard supporters, “At Hull FC we are only ever really a week away from a poor performance”.

I also thought about our close defeat in ‘the backyard of the Trafford Centre’ last season and the last time I watched the City Reds, when an expansive and adventurous saw them beat the Dobbins, and I pondered as to what our afternoon in Lancashire would bring? Then on the way we heard the news that Noble was their new Coach and I knew that would pump them up even more.

We had a good drive over in sunshine, then cloud, but as we arrived at the ground the rain was starting to fall, which with a swirling wind and a greasy playing surface made conditions quite difficult. I once again marvelled at the fact that they charge you £5 to park in a car park that takes 35 minutes to get out of after the game, but at least since our last visit they had

changed the arrangements for accommodating away fans. On Saturday we were not put on the standing area at the end, where the low terracing made viewing what was happening down the field last season very difficult indeed, but instead the 800 or so FC fans were squeezed into a block of seats at one end of the West Stand.

14.51 Saturday afternoon, and Salford ain’t breaking no attendance records!

From the Kick off we witnessed a bizarre passage of play when referee Hicks missed two passes so far forward that they could have easily graced the Super Bowl, then there was a reefed ball involving Gleeson that was right in front of us and that was lost without a Hull hand being anywhere near it and a second penalty which then saw Pitts, quite rightly, being sin binned for

holding a Salford player back. That final bit of frustration was followed by a Salford try wide out. That score was pretty inevitable at the end of a catalogue of naff refereeing decisions which if you described them as wooden, would be doing a disservice to trees.

As “Are you Ganson in disguise” rang around the terraces it was a tough start and fielding a young side, which had lost Briscoe to a dead leg just before kick-off, it could have spelt disaster, but the team held their nerve, saw out the reduction to 12 men without any further alarms and from then on didn’t really look like losing. I guess to say that, and then go on to only beat the Super League ‘whipping boys’ by 6 points, is a bit of a paradox really. But that late Broughton try, when we were down to 12 men for the second time in the game, only served to make it look much closer than it was. The other two Salford tries came on the back of double penalties, which we could have done without, but otherwise our discipline and patience was first class and the game was played for long periods with The City Reds desperately trying to get out of their own half.

Although it wasn’t pretty, it was an interesting contest. The home side would have all been out to impress their new boss and also contained several ex FC players like Gleeson, Broughton, Williams and ‘Wagga’ Godwin. Whilst to add even more spice to the afternoon in the dugout were Alan Hunte, Sean Long and Ryan McGoldrick. I have to say here that it certainly wasn’t a classic and at times we all bemoaned the lack of enterprise and width, but looking back I guess that was all about us striving to control things in the middle and contain

and compact a home side who had decided their only chance was to throw the ball around from the off.

It was far from impressive at times but it was a win, the third in a row and one that, thanks to an easy win for Huddersfield, took us into the top 8. Again we controlled things and again we were patient and took our chances. As the team seems to get younger by the week there were some good performances from our ‘elder statesmen’ who steadied the ship, with Horney vying this week with Richard Whiting for the man of the match accolade, as they and Heramaia controlled things on attack and Houghton and O’Meley did well down the middle. Here it comes again folks, the phrase I never expected to say ever again; Horney’s kicking game was superb! Although Whiting himself got in on the act with a gem of a bouncing grubber into the corner for the Lineham try. Horney, broke to set up a try for Rich in the first half, while Stilts himself showed the youngsters what you get for persistence and bravery as he charged down a thunderous kick at point blank range, collected the ball and strode over to score himself.

Around these older heads, the youngster stood up really well, as we named a back line with an average age of just 21 and a substitute bench which featured three young forwards in Chris Green, Josh Bowden and Dean Hadley. Jason Crooks did really well and is certainly a strong runner and Watts drove in well against a stuttering Salford front row. Of course as always there were other injuries to come as Arundel who had again looked to be improving week on week fell to an innocuous tackle in the 77th minute, which will see him out for two months. Hero of the day Whiting also copped one, being withdrawn near

the end and returning to applaud the crowd with an ice pack just above his knee. Thankfully however afterwards he was walking better and indicating that it had been diagnosed as a dead leg, which should see him OK for the Cup match or at worst by the Wigan game comes around and we need him because he had a fine match. Just a quick mention too for Joe Westerman’s goal kicking which, in the absence of Tickle, was first class too.

So its two more points as we now find ourselves just behind Saints who were expected to be front runners this year and just three points off third. It wasn’t pretty but the youngsters out there on Saturday certainly learnt a lot, showed a deal of poise and really didn’t panic at all. For me that’s highly commendable and just goes to prove that the programme of simultaneously training them alongside the senior professionals, (that Gentle has held dear to our development as a Club), is certainly working. Quite frankly at this stage of the season and in our current predicament I’ll take 2 points wherever we can get them.

So to the week gone by and even before Joe Arundel’s injury the news on Danny Tickle wasn’t what we wanted to hear was it? Poor old Danny, he’s just got back and started to show some form and his knee goes; he must be gutted. The fact that before it happened he was the favourite to lift the Cup at the ‘Strictly Yeamo’ dancing event last Tuesday, just added insult to injury and he was certainly disappointed when I spoke to him at the event. We are certainly struggling injury wise and as we get a player back, we seem to lose another. Still it looks like Gareth Ellis will be back by the Wigan game and Yeamo tells

me he will be having his pot off his hand today and could get a run out at the weekend. As for Daniel Holdsworth well who knows, certainly not him, he puts his hand up every week but has no idea when he will be cleared to play as the Club continues to err on the side of caution with regard to his lingering concussion.

I don’t know about you but as our injury crisis deepened I did get to wondering about what had happened to Liam Kent. 22 last week he has certainly had a long period of rehab and slipped from everyone’s minds after looking really promising last year. However yesterday he played on duel registration for York City Knights against Dewsbury, he showed up well in the second row and is expected to line up for an even younger first team, when we start our journey in the Challenge Cup this Sunday at 1-00pm, against the North Wales Crusaders.

I talked a bit last week about the tools that Coaches use to build team spirit and we heard of another such ploy in the context of Liam, when it was said that he had won the last two players ‘Trainer of the month’ awards which are an internal and much coveted honour amongst the team. Last year I was impressed with Liam before he was injured and I thought that he was improving and showing signs of developing into ‘another’ useful second rower. I hope he gets a reasonable break and a run without any injuries.

Talking of that Cup game we certainly seem to have a habit of getting a home draw in the first round (proper) of the Challenge Cup, and this year for a change after a run against Super League Clubs in the past 4 seasons, we not only play again at the KC but also against a third tier team. This should surely must see us progress next weekend into the hat for the 5th

round. The last time we played the men from North Wales was in the Super League in that memorable game in Wrexham when we cheered them from the field after it had been announced that they were folding and leaving the competition. Since then thanks to a rescue bid by the fans they are now back and doing well at the top of Co-operative Championship One. It’s great that they have kept going, but as still a shadow of their former selves, surely we should win easily.

Now onto something personal that occurred to me and made me smile this week. Its funny what happens to you on occasions when you least expect it. There I was last Monday in the changing rooms at Total Fitness getting dried after another session of ‘holding back the years’ which incidentally once again hadn’t worked!! These two guys who I didn’t know, but who were obviously FC fans, were speaking in loud tones about how they had been told by an ‘excellent’ source in the Walton Club before the Catalans game that Daniel Holdsworth was unhappy at Hull FC and was on his way back to Australia. The Walton Club I thought, Wow it must be true!!! Then, all of a sudden, a guy came round from the next changing bay and said to them, “That’s not true, he’s going (expletive) nowhere”, the conversation continue thus, “How do you know” , “I just Do!” “Well this is from a good source, so who are you then?”, “Me?” he said with a smile, “I’m Daniel Holdsworth”............ a long silence then ensued and I guess for all of us who had heard that particular rumour, that answers that one.

Just a quick mention for BBC 1’s drama ‘The Syndicate’, which is not normally the stuff I would watch, but the way that playwright Kay Mellor has intertwined Bradford Bulls and their previous difficult financial times into the plot about what

happens to you if you win the lottery, is excellent and must be good for Rugby League. ‘This Sporting Life’ it ain’t, but it’s still very well written.

Well there is certainly little doubt that over the years we have seen plenty of spats and fallouts both in public and in private between our Club and the fans, the media, the Council, the SMC and just about everyone else. So I guess the happenings between our owner and the ubiquitous Garry Schofield should be taken in our stride and with an enormous pinch of salt. In fairness to Schofield in his League Express column on Easter Monday he said a lot of things that we all thought about our Club, the Derby performance, our tactics and our prospects for the rest of the season.

Once Schofield had said it, it’s only reasonable for Adam Pearson to have a right of reply and he indeed did that in quite strong terms in his programme notes for the Catalan game. For this fan, that’s where it should have finished and Schofield should, I think, have just commented something like, “I seem to have upset Adam Pearson, but I stand by my comments of last week” That would have been it, he’d have made his point, no-one would have lost any face at all and we’d all have moved on.

Of course Schofield has to have the last word, he’s made a living out of it, so he replies and his arguments become personal and increasingly petty. Of course this fan will never forgive him for the way he carried on back in the late 80’s when he demanding a move from Hull the day after we parted

company with Lee Crooks. Me, well I shouted ‘Judas’ and threw 30 pieces of silver with the best of ‘em on the Threepenny’s and ever since those days it seems Mr. S. has done little to engender any respect with this particular fans, seeming as he does to take every opportunity there is to have a go at us. The way folks rose to that bait over the years I think made him realise that once you’ve stopped playing, if you can’t Coach, the best way to get cheap exposure is by dishing out cheap insults to everybody and everyone particularly when they are down.

That piece last week in the League Express was pure vitriol at times and totally uncalled for really. Needing to have the last word like some petulant kid, Schofield went into another rant as the ‘Toys came out of the pram’ good and proper! The fact is he has never done anything to endear himself to the Hull crowd, but now he's trying to take the moral high ground by stating that it’s a fact that thousands of us are ‘having a go’ at the Club and Pearson and now all of a sudden he's one of us. It’s certainly a fact that this is nothing new and over the years in here I have pilloried him for the derogatory comments he has made about my Club more often than not in the name of cheap sensationalism.

If you look closely at what he says in LE most of it is inaccurate, he calls the present state of the Club a shambles, which believe me if he'd seen what went on in the ‘back office’ in Kath’s day is a complete fabrication. The sorts of things he said were, "Since Pearson took over the Club has made a series of calamitous decisions and appointments. The Pressure has clearly got to you Adam and perhaps it’s time to step aside.... It’s time Adam

to get your finger out and get down to business" That’s rich from a ‘failed’ Coach; he was a great player, but that’s about it as far as I’m concerned! I remember well his antics towards us at Huddersfield in that final game in 1997 when we gained promotion.

There as player Coach of the Giants on the field at the end he was pretty abusive towards us lot, in a game that saw us go up! I guess at the end of the day what galls me is that when we were doing well a few years ago he was critical of us probably because he couldn’t stand us being successful, but now we have hit a bumpy patch he’s trying to aligning himself with the fans against the Club. That’s because I think it doesn’t matter from which angle he comes from as long as he has a go at Hull FC. Believe you me folks, he's no friend of ours and just hops onto any passing bandwagon to bash the Club we love. As fans paying our way and enduring the hurt, we all have every right to criticise after games like the Derby, but what right has he to do it and then claim he’s one of us, when over the years he has done nothing but ridicule us all. For me at least, I believe he is just a cheap sensationalist who talks a bit of sense sometimes and a lot of rubbish most times and for this fan it’s a case of ‘Once a Judas always a Judas’, but that’s just my personal view of course!

With three elite performance centres now in place at St Mary’s, Bishop Burton and Sirius there is little doubt that Pearson has made massive strides forward on his promised development of youth and that fact and the number of youngsters we have blooded in the first team in the last two seasons, makes a mockery of what Schofield had to say anyway. Talking of that

situation, it was great to hear this week how well Gentle’s idea for a school for playmakers at the Club is progressing too. Six of our young players from the club's academy and scholarship sides have been spotted and hailed for their suitability with regard to their potential to progress to a higher level in the game and they now take part once a month in the Clubs unique half back school.

There they have the opportunity for a whole day to train, work out and eat etc. with the first team, as well as gaining direct one-to-one contact time with Head Coach Peter Gentle and his coaching staff, as well as experience ‘playmakers’ like Daniel Holdsworth, Danny Houghton , Aaron Heremaia, Shannon McDonnell, Gareth Ellis and Richard Horne. I’ve been told that their development and improvement has already been clear for all to see as they take in what they are told and go away and hone those skills in their various team games.

Whatever Schofield thinks about this idea and no doubt he would rubbish it too, for me it’s an excellent development, an indication of how far we have come as a Club and one that has to benefit these kids. If Gentle can oversee players like, Lineham, Kent, Crooks, Green, Bowden, Shaul and Hadley making the transition, almost seamlessly, from the under 19’s to the first team, who is to say in a couple of years time we won’t be awash with home grown half backs. That would certainly make us the envy of the rest of the League and I guess we can but hope, although just one as good as our last top class product Richard Horne would be nice! Sometimes you know, although times are tough at present, it’s probably fair to

say that if we are still pretty crap in three years time, then it won’t be for the want of trying.

Well if you went down to ‘Strictly Yeamo’ at the City Hall last Tuesday you will have no doubt had a memorable night, in fact whatever he does on the field, you’ll probably never look at Tom Lineham in the same way again either! It was a tremendous evening when 750 fans cheered on 6 FC players who had all spent a lot of time and effort learning to dance.

Looking the part.... but don’t quit the day job Yeamo!!

The fact that Yeamo, Horney, Tom Lineham, Tom Briscoe, Danny Houghton and Liam Cunningham had all taken the whole thing very seriously is extremely commendable; singing is one thing, most of us do it at some time or other, but dancing is completely another! So, it ended up with us all watching a keenly competitive night with lots of laughs. In addition it also raised around £4000 for Yeamo’s year.

Of course Kirk won, but there is little doubt that the lifts and routine that young Liam Cunningham produced revealed he’d got the idea and the professional dancer who was one of the judging panel did indicate that if he doesn’t make in Rugby League another career could be beckoning. So, all in all a great night of entertainment and a lot of great sports who all did their bit to support their colleague’s big year. Boy, they were all nervous before they started and as for Tom Lineham, well he was clearly struggling with some of the more technical moves, so he tried his best to cover his dancing inadequacies by wearing a pair of pants with the backside removed, a thong and a bra!!! Not for me, I hasten to add, but the ladies loved it! I don’t like that ‘Strictly’ stuff on TV, but this had to be seen to be believed and thanks to some excellent compeering by James Clarke, we all had a great night!

The Final line up; Liam Cunningham the Billy Elliott wannabee!

Oh what a shame it is! I’ll really miss Mr Ganson (not) as he moves ‘upstairs’ to make a ball’s up of setting the rules instead of his usual practise of making a hash of interpreting them! I don’t think we have heard the last of him by a long chalk, in fact it will no doubt be an even bigger boost to that already inflated ego, but I do think we are best rid of him at the sharp end don’t you? It will certainly be interesting to see what he does ‘On High’ about tightening up on some of the things he has experienced firsthand on the field. This is his chance to make some improvements and I predict that he will immediately get tough on forward passes (in all games but the Magic ones) and on high tackles (in all matches other than local Derby’s), oh, and deem that all referee’s who upset a set of fans at home one week, will get that team in their following game and must warm up in front of them at the away end!

Well it’s often said that it’s a funny old game and of course it is, (Mr Ganson’s appointment certainly proves that one), however there is little doubt that were Hull FC to be sitting second in the table and looking good, we would undoubtedly be attracting crowds of at least 14,000. It’s hard in the current economic climate, but we all know those fans who turn out in ‘Fair Weather’, (if not the ‘Any Kinda’ variety), who’d flood back to join the bandwagon in those circumstances. Of course they are the folks our owner is after getting back to the KC. However Huddersfield, who are now indeed up there and going well at present, are still struggling to get a reasonable level of fans into their ground. It’s not as if it’s a dump either, because for me it’s one of the better arenas at which to watch our game. The Giants have made a great start to their 2013 campaign, with nine wins from their opening twelve fixtures and at present to me, don’t look likely to fade as they have done before. However their home attendances have certainly not reflected that success on the pitch.

While leaders Wigan Warriors have again been averaging 16,000 and champions Leeds Rhinos 15,000, the Giants average for their opening five home Super League XVIII fixtures has been just 6,344 (only 5,641 yesterday although the opposition wasn’t very attractive)– and amazingly that’s down 1,400 on last season. You have to ask yourselves just how long their Chairman Ken Davey will continue to shell out to underpin their operation from his personal fortune, before he ‘does a Hudge’ and decides he’s had enough!

Of course when you look a little more closely, gates have been a major problem across the League, with Castleford joining London, Huddersfield and Salford in the doldrums as far as attendances are concerned. In fact Saints gates at their shiny new Stadium are down this season by an amazing 3,194 on the corresponding games last year.

I also believe that the departure of Ian Millward from Castleford Tigers this week was as much driven by a need to raise gates as anything else. It seemed to me that as soon as the crowd figure was announced for last Saturday’s Castleford game at home to those same Huddersfield Giants, Millward’s future was bleak. Just 3,222 fans turned up and considering the Tigers have more than 3,500 members in their much vaunted membership scheme it’s certainly worrying. To me it indicates that what was happening when we were struggling mid season in 1999 and some season ticket holders actually stayed away, is happening at Cas. Ok it was a Saturday kick off, on TV and on Grand National Day and all that in an area where there were at least 5 senior local amateur games taking place.

Although few travelled the 30 odd miles from Huddersfield, a lot of home fans had obviously voted with their feet after an outcry in the rugby mad town involving the style of rugby Millward was delivering. So of course in the end the argument came round, (as it always does), to getting rid of the Coach. The Tigers are struggling for money as it is and they simply can’t afford to have gates dipping as low as last weekend’s, nor can they afford to pay off a Coach with a year and a half left on his contract, but that’s the balancing act a company such as the Castleford Tigers has to cope with.

I guess sacking Basil was therefore a calculated business decision that had to be made, but taking a bigger view of

things, the Tigers are certainly not on their own. Rugby League is a great game, a great product and has some wonderful fans, but at present, at least a quarter of our Super League Clubs and most of those in the lower Divisions, are deep in debt and for want of a better phrase, in crisis.

Still on that theme and I see that another struggling organisation the London Bronco’s are to leave the Stoop and ply their trade at yet another Ground in the Capital next year. The experiment of playing our game in London has been a long and drawn out affair which has, in recent years never reached the heights it did in the first few years that the game was played in the Capital. As its Cup weekend, this week in Codgers Corner I’d like to go back and feature a game that perhaps quite a few readers actually attended down there in the Capital.

I want to take you back to an historic game in the 1981/82 season when the FC Army took around 3500 fans all the way to London to watch the FC play a Challenge Cup game at the newly formed Fulham Club. The London outfit had been promoted to the top flight after just one season in the Second Division and were really making an effort to establish the game in the capital. In fact their average home gate that season was a very healthy 10,000 and after heavy marketing to the Australian and New Zealand exiles living in the capital, hopes were high that the experiment would be a success.

That day in Feb ‘82 we travelled down by car, changing drivers at Leicester Forest East, and arrived in the capital about an hour before the scheduled kick-off at 3-00pm. We parked in one of those wonderful streets of yellow brick terraced houses that denoted the area around the famous Craven Cottage ground and walked off to the match. We were all stone cold

sober (a rare occurrence in those days, I have to say) because of the driving and our late arrival at the Ground.

Craven Cottage was a great little Stadium back then, perched as it still is on the banks of the Thames, and this northern lad can still remember vividly being taken aback, as from our vantage point in the North Stand we watched as behind the stand opposite, two 6 men rowing crews in long boats battled it out at an amazing pace down the River Thames.

The teams ran out from the Old half wooded ‘Craven Cottage’ building which was situated in the corner to our left and from the kick off it was obvious that the Londoners were really up for a scrap. They were trying to find their feet in the faster and tough top division and were still positioned near the bottom of the table, but were led by Reg Bowden and Harry Beverley two big names that the club had imported from ‘Up North’ to spearhead their challenge. They certainly fancied their chances of getting to Wembley, whilst we expected a physical game and got it. However there were also moments of high drama and the surprise return from injury of Bowden, saw the hosts play way above themselves in an enthralling encounter. I remember it as one of the tensest, ‘nerve jangling’ Cup clashes that I have seen.

In fact the Londoners probably looked back ruefully at two disallowed tries that would, had they been given, have certainly put a different complexion on the game with The FC ending up dumped out of a cup competition, that we were in the end destined to win in that fabulous replay at Elland Road. Don’t get me wrong, referee Mr Fox got both decisions spot on, but the hosts still counted themselves unlucky in the end.

The first quarter was a really dour affair with the Fulham pack led by two giant props Harry Beverley and Peter Souto ripping into our 6. These two rampaged up the field on several occasions scattering our forwards and both Tindall and Stone played themselves to a standstill in the first half repelling attack after attack. Reg Bowden brilliantly orchestrated the London attack and both centres Hussein M’Barki and Diamond looked dangerous on the fringes. Shining light for the FC in those early exchanges was Trevor Skerrett who was not expected to play at all, but made a surprise return from a groin injury. Visibly limping, time and again he drove the ball into the heart of the Fulham defence and twice he broke the line by swatting away the attentions of second rowers Wood and Gurley.

We tried hard to get the ball wide to our speedy outside backs but Fulham were determined to not allow us to use our extra pace out there and time and again they moved up quickly to cut out that final pass to the wing. Both sides sparred with each other, but there was little doubt that Fulham were on top before the game moved up a notch on the 25th minute mark. The host’s second rower Wood charged through a gap, linked superbly with John Crossley and the stand-off beat the whole FC defence as he raced to the line to touch down. Diamond who had scored in every Fulham game that season, kept his record intact with the conversion and we were 5-0 down. Back Hull came and for the first time we pressurised the hosts in their own 25. Skerrett produced a very unlikely kick ahead and should have scored, but the ball shot off down the slope and ran dead before he could get to it, then Tony Dean who was having a fine game dropped the ball with only full back Allen to beat.

In those days when all seemed lost though there was one man that could sort things out and make the difference; enter ‘Knocker’ Norton. Tindall, Dean and Topliss carved out a position with a flowing move down field and at the play the ball Knocker went into acting half. Quick as a flash he scooped the ball up and glided between three defenders as only he could, to score next to the posts. Crooks added the goal and we were level. Then the last act of the first half saw the first of the disallowed Fulham tries, when a pass at least a yard forward put Diamond over in the corner, only for Mr. Fox to blow up for an obvious offence. Drawing at half time was unexpected in some ways, but having seen the tenacity and passion of the home team, acceptable in others.

The second half saw a fine drizzle starting to fall, but it did nothing to dampen what was turning into a gripping encounter. Fulham again came out fired up and laid siege to our line. After just two minutes Bowden put Husain M’Barki in under the sticks but as the centre ran towards the Fulham fans to celebrate referee Mr Fox was having none of it, as perfectly positioned just to the right of the play, he called the final pass forward again. On this occasion it was a tight decision that could have gone either way really. We were under some real pressure before a big ‘break out’ move down field by Duke, Kemble and O’Hara set up a position for Tony Dean to drop a goal and at 6-5 we were in front for the first time in the game.

For the first time too, as their big forwards tired, we really stretched their cover, with Terry Day and Steve Evans just failing to get in as both fell to desperate last ditch ‘trip’ tackles. But 11 minutes later a fabulous move engineered again by Norton, who touched the ball three times in one passage of play, saw Stone and Steve Evans, created some space wide out on the left, for Paul Prendiville to sneak in (right opposite

where we were stood), low to the ground in the corner. A magnificent touch line conversion from Crooks made it 11-5, and at last we had a bit of breathing space. That was the final score, but not the end of the story by any means, as Fulham threw everything at us in that final ten minutes.

Tony Duke who had lost the scrums 6-1 in the second half made up for it as he tackled his heart out and with three minutes to go he denied the home team a certain try, when he tackled both Bowden and Kinsey in one set piece move from a tap penalty. That seemed to signal the end for the hosts with the last few minutes being played out in the middle of the field and as the final whistle went, we were in the hat for the quarter finals. Those two disallowed tries, one by the narrowest of margins, certainly made all the difference, as for once luck seemed to be with us. Looking back I guess although Fulham had done so much right, it was in the end Hull FC’s professionalism and will to win at any cost as well as of course, the great Knocker Norton, that got us through.

So it’s the Cup weekend and we should be OK shouldn’t we? I know we are unpredictable at times, but we have to have too much for the North Wales outfit don’t we? It’ll be interesting to cross swords with Stuart Reardon again and Paul Johnson’s brother, who plays Full Back for them too. It will be interesting to see who Gentle selects to play because we need to rest a few, give youth a chance, but still ensure that the game isn’t anything more than a formality. It will certainly be the oppositions ‘Cup Final’ and they’ll certainly be fired up for it! I hope we get a decent gate and that they get a good bit of cash from it, but 1-00pm on a Sunday is certainly a strange time to stage a game and attract a crowd.

As for the week ahead well who knows, although I expect the announcement of a new kids Club for Hull FC is imminent and I hear that Gareth Ellis has got the all clear from the Club Doctor to play against Wigan, while Johnson and Yeamo could well be back at the weekend. Thanks as always for your support of the Diary, to Bill, Biff, Jeff, Rich in London and Simon for your E mails and particularly to Phil who is working in Java and who is probably our ‘farthest flung’ reader to date, (if of course you know differently, please let me know). After a pretty valiant effort at Salford from the youngsters, let’s just get through to the next round eh? See you at the KC on Saturday and.......

Come on You Hullllaaaarrrr!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Faithfully Yours

Wilf

P.S. Hers one for your Diaries!