fevnut's musings 2025/#06: Ince Rose Bridge, Big Challenge Cup problem and Miscellany

 

We were somewhat perplexed by this match. Great, we are through to the 4th round although we won’t know our opponents and venue until Saturday. For anyone who hasn’t already found out, the draw will be shown live on BBC2 at half time of their televising of the Super League match between St. Helens and Salford. That match kicks off at 5.30 so if you don’t want to watch the Super League match just go over to BBC2 at about 6.10.

What perplexed us about last Sunday was comparing the Ince game to the one in the previous round against Waterhead. There is absolutely no doubt in our mind that Waterhead were a much better team than Ince Rose Bridge and yet we put 88 points over Waterhead but only(!) 68 against Ince. On the other hand, the difference did show in as far as we nilled Ince but conceded 10 points to Waterhead who scored two good tries.

We thought that there were two stand-outs for Fev in the match, although we wouldn’t suggest that there were any individual weaknesses in the side.

Thomas scored two tries and the first one was brilliant with dummies and side steps. It was definitely the try of the match and was rightly recognised by RL fans, in general, in a poll for tries of the round. But it wasn’t just his tries. He made by far the best scoot from dummy-half in the first half which led to King Vuniyayawa’s try and he also produced a long pass for Gaz Gale’s 2nd try.

Danny Addy, playing his first match in 2025, didn’t score a try but he provided two passes to fellow pack members to put them in for tries. The first was for Jimmy Beckett to give Jimmy a stroll in from short range and the second for Clay Webb from much further out but Clay’s speed took him easily over the try-line. We do love to see good inter-passing between forwards. And then there was his goal kicking (7 from 8) when he took over from Calum Turner when Calum limped off with what appeared to be a hamstring problem.

We will be interested to see who James Ford picks at half-back for the Doncaster game. Assuming that Ben Reynolds is fit he must surely be one of them for his general leadership of the team around the pitch and also because he is our number one goal kicker. It must be a hard choice then whether Ben is paired with Lacans or Herring. Lacans for his moments of brilliance or Herring for his tenacity although he does need to find a way of improving his discipline without losing the tenacity.

While on the subject of goal-kickers, we seem to be blessed. As we have already said, Ben Reynolds is clearly first choice, but we do have reliable back-up with Calum Turner, Danny Addy and Thomas Lacans.

 

Cup Giant Killers

It would appear that the gap between Super League clubs is getting wider and wider and that must be of concern for the health of rugby league in general. Occurrences of Super League clubs getting beaten by others in the Challenge Cup seems to be getting rarer and rarer and that, we think, is one of the reasons why fans seem to have become far less excited by the Challenge Cup, witnessed by the falling attendances.

Of course, we did have, Bradford beating Castleford last weekend. Other noteworthy giant-killing acts in the summer era include Salford (then a First Division club) beating Wigan 26-16 in 1996. A result that must have been joyfully greeted by all RL fans outside Wigan, as it ended Wigan’s boring run of winning the Challenge Cup eight times in a row. Another wonderful example, Hunslet (NL2) beating Huddersfield 18-14 in 2003, and for us the most memorable of all Fev knocking out Castleford 23-16 in 2012.

Contrast the rarity of giant-killing feats in the Challenge Cup with those in the F.A. Cup. It was brought home to us last Sunday when we saw that the Championship bottom club, Plymouth, had knocked out Premiership leaders, Liverpool. Unthinkable nowadays in RL! There are very few Challenge Cup results to match the sheer amazement and excitement when top division soccer clubs get knocked out by lower ranked clubs such as Leeds (then in National League 1) beating Manchester United 1-0 at Old Trafford in 2010, Wrexham (then bottom of the 4th Division) beating Arsenal 2-1 in 1992, and, possibly the most amazing result, when amateurs, Hereford, beat Newcastle 2-1 in 1972.

But the contrast is even more stark when you look at the margins of defeat when top sides play teams from lower leagues. The FA cup games are much more keenly contested as shown by the scores at the end of normal time. Here are the scores at normal full time from last weekend’s cup competitions.

 

To help we have colour coded the teams: red for Tier One, blue for Tier 2, green for tier 3, and purple for tier 4 (soccer) or community clubs (RL).

Is it any wonder that soccer supporters are much more enthused about the FA cup than RL supporters are about the Challenge Cup.

For the sake of RL as a whole (including Super League clubs) we need a big rethink about the future governance of rugby league.

As we were thinking about this an email dropped into our inbox from AllOut Rugby League. We mentioned them last week and said that they seem to be the best online site for RL news. This latest email revealed that they had seen an agenda for a Rugby League Council meeting to take place in Wakefield on March 12th. It’s worth all RL fans having a read. We will comment on the agenda next week when we have had more time to think about it.

Miscellany 

As King Vuniyayawa scored his try last Sunday we turned to our neighbour and suggested a record that should be played over the tannoy when he does score – ‘God Save the King’! A few years back each player had his own theme song which would be played when he scored and the fans loved it. We have never understood why it was dropped and we think it would help bring the excitement of the occasion back. Another track got played when there was a skirmish which always brought laughter and helped lighten the mood. It was ‘I see trouble ahead’! Great choice. 

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Wonderful news, that under the new disciplinary system, Connor Wynne’s suspension has been reduced from 6 to 3 games which means he could be back next week. However, he will need to be squeaky clean as the totting up process means that when a player gets subsequent suspensions they will be for longer and longer.

The flags above represent all the nations that, under current rugby league rules, members of the 2025 Fev squad have played for, or are eligible to play for.