Aye.

There ain't too many Dream Teams selected where the 7th placed SL club gets 5 of their players included.

To be fair it sums up both the league and where we are as a club.

We have some top players, but that team is increasingly becoming made up of players who are past their best.

Names, Lieutenant!

Yeah, but the other 8 were sooooo awful.

I may be being overly pedantic and / or philosophical but isn't the 'Dream team' arguably the one that achieves the end goal? (In this case winning the SL?)

Obviously I understand the concept of 'dream team' (ie. the best players in each position across all those competing) but put it this way - would you rather there were 8 or 9 Leeds players but no SL title, or 0 or 1 Leeds players, but the title?

I think some of the 5 who got in were more by default rather more than anything else.

yes I think a new coach is needed. BM has been frustrating. the trophy haul, for which he deserves fantastic credit has been tempered with some abject displays, odd use of subs and bizarre tactics. its rumoured he will move upstairs at the end of this season to oversee RL and RU sides. a good move for him and the club I would say.
A new coach would then be free to overhaul the side and possibly this is why major recruitment has been left to next season

I'm not sure Briscoe could currently be considered one of the best wingers in the league but I think Hall and Hardaker are fair shouts. I think both Wigan wingers, Monaghan, Makinson and a couple others are ahead of Briscoe, certainly in terms of last year's superleague form, but if you mean as a complete unit I think it's a fair opinion. For my own part I don't think there's much in it with the Wigan back three though to be honest.

I agree with your second point too. It was a revelation to see how Hall's form improved at the four nations playing alongside Sarginson. I know he always seems able to raise his game at international level but, nevertheless, they really seemed to gel as a partnership. Sarginson certainly had the knack of creating the space Hall thrives in and we all know the standard of his finishing when he gets that kind of space! I think this raises a point that Tad Rhino brings up in his post. I'm not convinced that the Leeds back 5 are the best [uas a unit[/u. Individually they have all the credentials but it's the partnerships that appear lacking to me.

Just as a point of comparison with Wigan (which is obviously the team I see most) it seems to me that the partnerships are more than the sum of their parts. Burgess had an outstanding first season playing outside Sarginson culminating in being nominated for YPOTY and elevation into the national squad. Charnley scored 19 tries in just 16 games playing outside Gelling who was immense in making the hard yards which, as a result, made it much easier for Charnley to do what he does best in finishing tries. This last partnership in particular maybe highlights the problem best. The stats suggest Hall is doing far too much work away from the tryline. I don't know the reasons for this, of course, but I'm guessing from your post and others that it's a combination of misfunctioning halves and Moon simply not putting him in space as he perhaps should be.

Whatever the reasons, I think it's fair to say that the combinations as they stand aren't really getting the best out of the individual players. This might be a simplistic solution (albeit one that's been known to work) but has a switch of wing/centre partners ever been tried? Watkins' and Hall's games seem more suited to me, although I would qualify that by saying that is based purely on skillset rather than ever having seen either played 'out of position'. Perhaps the same could be true for Moon and Briscoe?

I'm one of those who can only visualise Hardaker at FB and while I wouldn't claim there were many, if any, better at that position playing in SL I do acknowledge that some attacking aspects of his game are perhaps limited. It's unfortunate that our centres (and I don't include Ablett, BTW) share some of these deficiencies. These deficiencies are of course compounded by slow ball from the ruck area.

I don't think its the slow ball it that our half backs never attack the line and neither have the speed these days to break it. The opposition know what's coming so they can get prepared.

Would anyone trial Briscoe at Centre and move Moon to the Wing? Briscoe looked a good centre on Boxing Day. I know people will say "Look at Vickery" but it was against a strong looking Wakefield Side.

Super League Fullbacks

[urlhttp://rugbyam.co.uk/top-5-full-backs-in-super-league/[/url

Who is this Briscoe?

I thought it was Broscoe????

pathetic one-eyed leeds rhinos biased rubbish
didnt they see his terrible 'per carry' stats?
etc etc

I think if one of the centres is missing then I'd like to see Briscoe moved there with Handley coming in on the wing. Keinhorst did an alright job for Way on loan when he eventually got injury-free but I think a club that's going to find itself in that middle 8 is about his level. Either way as long as we've seen the last of the Ward/Sutcliffe selection at centre.

Can't really say I see Moon as a winger, especially when ours are expected to run it hard back at the start of sets to give our forwards a breather. And that for me is the problem with Moon, he's not a natural centre IMO, wouldn't be a natural winger and whilst he has some skills that could suit a halfback position, could he lead a team around a pitch? Have the kicking game etc? He's a good RL player yet he has no clear cut position where he looks fully suited to.

With the same ponderous halfbacks in 2013 Watkins went on to score 8 tries in 6 games AS A WINGER with Ablett as his centre......so it can be done. That spell of games was probably Watkins best run of form over several games in the few seasons and it wasn't as a centre.

In fact during McDermott's spell as coach, Watkins has played wing 12 times and scored 15 tries there.

I'm not sure where this obsession with fast halfbacks comes from. Speed comes from using the ball, unless you have real speed like Johnson. If speed were the best measure Cooper Cronk wouldn't even be playing first grade nowadays.

I agree. Many seem to forget that for a chunk of the 2nd half of the 2013 season we had Burrow and Sutcliffe starting in the halves for us and it wasn't like things were massively different.

i agree that half backs do not need to be lightning fast to be successful, but as i eluded to earlier we do lack a half back that can constantly attack and break the defensive line, that is why my choice at stand off would have been travis burns who has been very successful in this role and whilst playing in a mediocre hull kr side despite not being the quickest half back around.

time will tell how good he will be in this role in a top side like saints, but ill bet that their outside backs get a lot more running chances and against a broken first line of defense than our outside backs do this season

i would be happy to see sutty given the chance to play this type of role for us this season but i can't see it happening

You don't need to be lightning fast, but you need to be a threat to the line, and put defenders in two minds as to what you are going to do. At the moment it feels like defenders can ignore McGuire or SInfield running at the lines partly because its unlikely, and partly because when they do you can react to it. McGuire is a much better half back than he was 10 years ago, but I'm not sure that makes him more effective

Speed creates options - it gets the defence in two minds if you look at the two top half backs in the NRL Johnson and Thurston both have an ability to break the line or at least commit a defender. Neither of our half backs have that ability.

Cronk is a kicking machine who fits perfectly with Bellamy's ultra-controlling game plan. It is no surprise that without a creative half back they are now a team in decline.

That is two years ago - time has moved teams have strengthen and our players have aged - even his great fans have to agree Sinfield had a terrible 2014. Maybe the winter off will spark him back into action and his form of 2013 will return.

Agree Watkins is in danger of not fulfilling his potential - the coaches need to work on him to move him to the next level.

IMO there aren’t really any halfbacks out there that have the combination of pace, skill, playmaking ability, good kicking out of the hand and consistency apart from Johnathan Thurston. He has the lot and stands out above anyone else. Cronk is more of a dependable type who can move a side around a field without doing the flashy stuff very often. He is utterly dependable though.

Shaun Johnson has it all apart from the consistency.

Over here there’s nobody that comes close. I think Leeds have lots of options at halfback which puts them in a stronger position than most other SL teams. A lack of pace isn’t a great handicap.

I agree and disagree with that. I agree you don't need fast halves. However I think that speed needs to come from somewhere.

People do seem to have a set idea in their heads of what each position must provide and Speed at half is one they see and I agree with you that isn't necessary.
I do however think that you need speed in the middle of the park, for some it comes from their halves, for some their fullback.

Cronk has played most of his career in front of Billy Slater who is no slouch

I don't think our problem is that we don't have enough speed in the halves it's that we don't have any speed at all in the middle of the park. The number of times i saw Watkins look back on his inside and see nobody last season was silly. Similarly our offloads were rarely on to a player steaming through and far more often to players either stood still or to forwards.

What the team is missing is what everyone dismissed as easy 10 years ago with McGuire. That player who can ghost through a gap, who is away before you know it and is on the shoulder of every ball carrier. I've said before that the thing stopping Hardaker being a world class player isn't his passing, it's his support play.

Indeed. I recall watching Iestyn at the Bulls do the same stuff he used to do for us to open gaps but being unable to get through them. Similarly, McGuire has reached that stage.

It's not essential to have lightening fast halves but when we play McGuire and Sinfield there we're at the other end of the spectrum. One is fine but both pose little threat as runners which makes them easier to defend.

Your preference for blogs rather than facts to back up your opinions explains everything