Providing he settles back in and has a good and healthy off season Corey Johnson will be the least spectacular but the best 9 at the club next year and should be the starter every week for me. I was chuffed to bits to see how he played last night. Super kid. Leeming and Lui in halves next week and Johnson at 9 for me if fit.

He wont dart about aimlessly, he wont throw to peoples knees or ears. He just does the job with the minimum of fuss like a proper 9 should. He wont sprint 25 yards to tackle a winger for no reason and leave holes galore in the middle of the park and be knackered after 10 mins cos hes run around like a lunatic.

Corey's weakness is his contact in defence but even now, after 18 months out, hes the best 9 at the club for that and he will improve. He took a bang early last night and was limping quite a bit and still looked good.

Our kids are very good and will learn the standard needed from last night. Saints are the benchmark in this competition. We had too many in last night. The club going forward is in a very healthy position tho.

Good post.

With a bit of luck Corey could be just as good if not better than a ‘new’ signing

Where did I “bag” Dwyer?

More a general comment to be honest not particularly aimed at you

Wasn't surprised by the quality of his distribution or his obvious composure, but was impressed with the physical side of his game. Looked more robust than I expected given his time away and a full pre season will only add to that. Bit of a test for Agar given the praise that has been showered on Leeming, but if he's in any doubt he should ask the likes of Gale, Sezer and Austin who they think should be starting nine.

You've gone a bit overboard yourself. Agree re comments on Walmsley but our "defensive" effort would have made any side look good. If your lot had put in a similar shift instead of us I reckon we'd be talking about an equally comprehensive Leeds win.

didnt see the game but on leeming in general I'm not totally sold.
too inconsistent although he has been messed around position wise.
doesnt lead the side around the pitch well enough fsonetimes too often directing them into attacking wrong areas.
if he can keep improving and a little more consiatency then yes. Dwyer is a nig no for me. cant pass, runs around like an idiot but is infectious and does spark us at times.
Corey could, and I use the word could, become the best 9 in the comp. potential ishuge

Fair dos - he’s great running at a tiring defence. I just feel his disorganisation does us no favours in the initial phases of games. And of course to use him means a bench spot, where players like Leeming and Johnson can play 80.

One of the reasons we have inconsistency is because we have too many inconsistent players with holes in their game.

Hope Dwyer has a good year again next year, but I can see us not renewing if Johnson stays and improves.

Good post Marty. Agree

I dont think Agar is in any doubt mate. He was truly gutted when Corey quit. He loved him and wanted him to be his starter. Throughout last 18 months or so hes always said he wishes Corey would come back and i know he was excited when talks begun. He belives Corey could be "the jewel in the crown" for Leeds thats how highly he thinks of him.

Early days for Corey but a very positive start. I really hope this works out. Ive watched him from.scholarship and always tnought he was the answer to our long term hooking issues. Best young 9 weve produced in years.

Your a harsh critic mate, and probably bit unrealistic with your expectations for the team we had out.....

I still reckon we could have the England front row in the next 2-3 years,

Just hope he keeps the tiger in his tank now.

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I just think Im able to assess the capacity of the side available and whether its got near its capabilities.

The most disappointing thing were those opening minutes from the off, running down dark alleys on the short side, passing to players knees, not getting to a kick then backing up with penalties. Regardless of players missing (we had 9 of our 1-17 playing) we should be better than that at least.

It was disappointing but Saints were just up for it and we weren’t, I don’t think theres much to over analyse, they need to put it to bed and move on, I don’t think last night defines the players.

Look at the season as a whole, weve had two really poor games, that IMO isn’t too bad considering the disruption and schedule

Yep agree with this. We just lost the battle physically and didn’t help ourselves with errors again.

I suspect Walters will lose his place to Gannon on that performance, but having Lui back is significant. He’s been good this year when he has played, and the knock on effect is that we get other players in best positions too.

I don’t think a game or two in the play-offs will do us any harm. It’s good experience for a developing squad.

I think that’s a bit generous, there’s been a few more than that and certainly some halves to forget and that’s the concern recently as against Wigan, Wakefield, Hull and last night we’ve had poor first halves. (Mitigating factors aside)

£1.25m of cap unavailable last night. Crazy really.

As others have said, Johnson was impressive last night. His distribution/organisation looked good and his passing to both sides was good. He was limping a bit and didn't appear at dummy half for a couple of sets, not sure if that was down to injury or fatigue but he did well.
Really hope he has rediscovered his desire to play SL.

I get what you are saying and it is frustrating re passing and inability to kick, however that is very much reflective of some of our key players (last night) capabilities. We know that Dywers distribution from dummy half is erratic, we know that Myler's field kicking is substandard. Both of those things were never going to change and to have any chance of getting in arm wrestle against Saints they would have had to.

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).