I understand those who are a bit upset by the performance levels tonight, but when you look at the line-up and see that we had 6 aged 21 or under and nothing resembling a starting side it was probably to be expected. Yes, we had 8 (9? 10?) first choice players missing, but we're at the 'square pegs in round holes' stage now (not that the BBC have mentioned that in their match report, it might have got in the way of drooling over Saints...

It's not simply how many players are missing, it's how many positions are in a completely make do and get by situation. By my reckoning we only had 4 1st choice players playing in their proper positions and in several cases we were using our 3rd/4th/5th choice players. That was never going to be pretty. I've never known a crisis quite like this one.

Leeds:
Broadbent (3rd choice Walker/Myler);
L. Briscoe (2nd choice T Briscoe),
Newman (1st),
T. Briscoe (3rd/4th Hurrell, L Sutcliffe, Broadbent),
Handley (1st);
Leeming (5th, Gale, Lui, McLelland, Myler),
Myler (4th, Gale, Lui, McLelland);
Holroyd,(4th? Oledzki, Tetevano, Vuniyayawa)
Dwyer (2nd, Leeming),
Prior (1st),
Walters (5th? Mellor, Donaldson, Gannon, L. Sutcliffe),
Martin (1st),
O'Connor (4th? Tetevano, L. Sutcliffe, Smith?)

Interchanges: Smith, A. Sutcliffe, Thompson, Johnson

If he stays he's the natural successor for Dwyer: however he's a different player and he might well be challenging Leeming too. Which is a good position to be in.

Last night wasn't without some bright lights but on the whole, individually and collectively a performance to forget. Credit to Saints too - mark of a champion side to take a loss and respond in that fashion when really there's nothing more on the line than pride. Not that we offered up many speedbumps in the road for them.

But even with those bad halves of games we’ve manage to get a win or st leadt not capitulate, last night was bound to happen at some point.

You cannot discount the injuries/bans and disruption that’s happened, if we had gone through the season with a relatively stable and fit squad (like saints catslsn and Warrington) and we were scratching around for 6th spot Id be very disappointed indeed.

Unfortunately this season is what it is

Honestly I wouldn't have Myler in the halves at Leeds unless there was noone else: I'd pick Broadbent, O'Connor, Martin, Smith ahead of him. His kicking makes me so angry I can't deal with it.

He is much better at FB where he can use his skill, roam about and provide the extra man in attack. I still hope and expect Walker to go past him for #1 next season though.

I'm starting to get Marty's rage about hooker as well - you can see all the pace and momentum ebb away from us with these constantly erratic passes. I'm not sure we had the pack to compete with Saints in any case last night, but we should have done a bit better.

If we do manage to get a fully fit squad before the start of next year, I'm really interested to see Agar's selection because there will be some good players not in the 17.

you probably would have been disappointed (but would have got over it quickly ) . we are looking better for next year and cas are looking worse but with a full side this year we would prob have been playing for 5th or 6th with cas and hull , kr i think are flattered by the lesser games played ...... the best years have come from settled sides 98 99 2004 mid 2005 2015 and (2017 when others had injuries )

This game underlined why Saints are the best team in SL IMO. They didn't really get out of first gear, not that they needed to either. I thought they were dead unlucky to lose against Catalans, who have flattered to deceive all year. While Catalans winning the GF might be good for RL geopolitics, I'm sorry, that team simply doesn't deserve it - not enough skill and far too many thugs (Tomkins, McIlorum, Maloney etc). I hope Saints are wound up enough to really put them to the sword when it matters. I'm still baffled as to why Catalans managed to get a game called off for their backroom staff catching COVID, and not get fined points by the RFL.

As for Leeds, a few positives - Myler looked sharp, as did Johnson when he came on. Some real selection headaches to come next year, even if recent history suggests we'll go another full season without being able to play a full-strength team (I hope the Bentley injury isn't bad).

I reckon if we'd had Tetevano or Oledski to take the edge of Walmsley's destructive running, it could have been a different scoreline, but then again the same could be said if the whole team hadn't been so soft in the first half. Running the ball on the last tackle of the first set said it all really - and it went downhill rapidly from there.

The numbers of players missing doesn't tell the whole story IMO (we probably can't count Walker, for example, who has been out all season). Hurrell likewise is too inconsistent. Mellor, Gannon, Sutcliffe, McLelland, and Vuniyayawa might have made incremental improvements but I doubt would have had a major impact. The real key losses for Leeds are players like Gale, Lui, Tetevano, and Oledski - we need 3/4 of them available if we have any hope of progressing in the play-offs this season (plus Myler, Prior, Newman, Leeming and Martin).