me for one is a fan of lee smith and if he does go to union it will be a waste as me for one would love him in a cas shirt next year

Surely nobody took Smith at centre seriously? this was either; an attempt to pacify the fans when Toopi wasn't replaced, try and keep Lee through creating a regular place in the team or a combination of the two.

Lee had never seriously played centre in his career why would he start now?

Wait until you see the PR shots, Lee looks real good in his Wasps gear.

You have no credibility whatsoever left, change your alias and hope nobody notices!!

I still beleive that with his footwork he'd have made a decent centre. Not the best, but good enough. We'll never find out now

Semi Tadulala?

really disappointed at this, Smithy's a quality player and to lose him is a big blow, though playing him at centre was an absolute nonsense. Wish the southern RU clubs would f**k off and leave our players alone, as he'll be back at Wigan in 2 years, slow, overweight and e.

Also, am I the only one who reckons we should let him go now and give one of the youngsters who actually wants to be at the club a go?

That's dumb, emotional, supporter perspective so I'd hope so yes.

On the flip side, perhaps knowing he's going at the end of the season may inspire Lee to find an extra 5-10% in his performances to sign off in good style, much as Gareth Ellis did last year?

I wouldn't be surprised however to see Wasps offer Leeds some compensation to release him early and enable him to get a full pre-season in down there.

I'm gutted and very disapointed in Lee Smith. He doesn't want to have a career at Leeds so thankyou very much and goodbye.. it's also a loss to RL in general.

GH better get his bloody cheque book out now or else there'll be blood.

It's funny cos i didn't feel the same way when Ellis went to Auz. Perhaps because he'd given us better service and had already got to the top of his game... Smith had so much more to give to Leeds and RL i'm very frustrated and annoyed.

Why are you disappointed in him? Does he somehow owe a greater debt of loyalty to his current employers than anyone in a "normal" job?

I say that because i'm speaking like a supporter of the club i love and i suppose Lee Smith is in a different situation with it being his 'work'. as i posted above, i just feel he is wrong to leave RL and Leeds.

if you was headhunted by another company and offered more money, you wouldnt go?

Depends on how much I liked my current job and who the company was who was recruiting me. So i don't knwo really

I know where your coming from though

Gutted he's going, at the back end of last season he was awesome.

Thanks Lee and good luck at Wasps.

In case its' escaped your attention he has played the last several games at centre so, yes, I took it seriously and it appears the coaching staff did too.

You do remember were we got Smith from?

Smith was average until the back end of last season. Had it been this time last year no one would have cared about him leaving and union clubs wouldnt even have been sniffing around.

It remains to be seen whether the good form was as a result of it being 'contract extension time' or he really can be that good consistently.

The same place his replacement will come from. The same place the eventual long term successor to Iestyn Harris came from, along with a large part of arguably the most successful Leeds side in its history.

Can't agree with that, Smith has been fantastic and done everything asked of him, has Smith every been accused of not giving 100% on these boards, how many MOM awards did he get between the lplay offs last year and before his injury this year

With Smith going and Ellis already departed and to a lesser extent Toopi not really replaced , That and the Eastwood non signing will this finally mean a quality centre for The Rhinos ? Jamie Lyon ?

Don't be silly. We most spend spend spend and look to the NRL.

After all, its' what the likes of Wigan do and we've been told they're an example to follow........

Ironic isn't it?

No sooner do the likes of Wigan and Saints cotton on to the fact that junior development is the way to go and produce the likes of Tompkins, Prescott, Wheeler, Lomax etc than Leeds fans start braying for the chequebook to come out at every opportunity.

Shall we review some of Leeds expensive big-name imports of recent years? Ben Walker? Matt Adamson? Brett Mullins? David Barnhill?

All great examples of what can be achieved by buying big from the NRL.

Lee Smith's replacement is/are aleardy here.

Ben Jones Bishop. I am not sure he has the utility value Smith has but he looked a classier full back than Smith did in his first stint at the number 1 jersey.

Jodie broughton. Much clamouring already on here this week for him to be back here and playing on our wing.

Kallum Watkins. It's common ground that pretty soon he will be a special centre. He's already doing some special things in the 1st team.

So there is full back, wing and centre - positions that Smith covered.