Leeds played with tactics to grind out a win and win by a point. Rather than giving the ball width and providing the best outside backs in the league with opportunities to win easy.

It was clear McDermott wanted to play one up rugby and complete the sets when really on the 4th and 5th tackles it should have been given to the backs to threaten Saints. Anyone can defend one up rugby.

Stevie Ward is not a centre, why place BJB on the bench if you have no intention of bringing him on.

I don't think we played particularly bad last night, it was just we played ridiculous tactics for the game. If we had got the offload game going and distributed to Watkins early more we would have won with ease.

I am very fed up of seeing McGuire too now. He is greedy, slow, always runs it in rather than pass and does some dumb things. Right at the end on the 4th tackle he ran towards touch when we were setting up for a drop goal. I'd 100% prefer Sutcliffe at 6 for the rest of the season.

McDermott seems unable to adapt to changes during the game and adapt his rotation policy. JJB playing with injured arm and unable to play at all in the second half.

Why not bring on JJB to full back, Hardaker to centre and use Ward in the second row. The second time this season we have left a sub on the bench for the full game. Just name sixteen players next time.

Offensive guile from the halves is lacking.With all that possession and territory they just did not ask enough questions of the saints defence.Add to that that there were some forwards in the Leeds pack who were passengers.Kirk with 4 carries, Clarkson is only championship quality, and Singleton's ball control is abysmal when he's on.

Six offloads in the whole match (3 Peacock, 2 Ablett, 1 Watkins) is pretty pathetic.

I'll defend Kirke in this instance, thought his defencewas outstanding, always winning the collision. He ran the ball in hard on his very rare carries too, it's a mystery why he didn't take it up more particularly as we were playing such one-out rugby and wouldn't know whether that's down to himor whether it was the plan.

says on saints board JP made 247 metres and did 44 tackles.another great effort if true.think he did the full 80 too.

Is McDermott's strategy to wear JP out early, encourage him to retire early (at the end of 2014)? Henceforth making Big Brian the most influential voice in the forward department. At the moment the players listen more to JP and not McDermott.

The tactics were wrong last night, instead of continually taking them on down the middle we should have moved the ball out wide. We have two of the best wingers in the SL who's only role in the game last night was to retrieve the ball after it had been kicked long by Saints.
The turning point for me was Saints second try when I thought we should have received a penalty when Makinson was stood in the way at the PTB which meant the Saints defenders could force the dummy half over the line for a drop out from which they scored. It was quite crucial as it gave saints the ball and six tackles near our line.
That said fair play to Saints they showed more endeavour in our twenty and deserved the win.

Good point about Makinson stood in Hardakers way RR we said at the game surely it was a pen for either not square or offside??
That said we did ourselves no favours with so much possession and very few points to show for it.

I was suprised that McQuire was well below par was expecting him to have more creativity but he still seems to be just a support player. Thought Sinfield didn't have enough influence on the game was left to Burrows to run across the defensive line to try and open up gaps

Quote ="Biff Tannen"says on saints board JP made 247 metres and did 44 tackles.another great effort if true.think he did the full 80 too.'" The stats from the game (at least those according to Opta) can be seen here : www.superleague.co.uk/report/9950 Quite how you can run that far for so little average gain (AG) is a continuing mystery this season. Peacock had at least one breather during the game - the one I recall lasted for all of about five minutes as McDermott seemingly doesn't trust his first choice available squad (bar Moon and Aiton) to be able to cope for any longer than that without him when facing the gutsy St Helen's reserve side sprinkled with a few ringers.

Quote ="Biff Tannen"says on saints board JP made 247 metres and did 44 tackles.another great effort if true.think he did the full 80 too.'" The stats from the game (at least those according to Opta) can be seen here : www.superleague.co.uk/report/9950 Quite how you can run that far for so little average gain (AG) is a continuing mystery this season. Peacock had at least one breather during the game - the one I recall lasted for all of about five minutes as McDermott seemingly doesn't trust his first choice available squad (bar Moon and Aiton) to be able to cope for any longer than that without him when facing the gutsy St Helen's reserve side sprinkled with a few ringers.

I can help you with that.

His carries were very strong. Just a shame there were only 4 of them. IIRC one was from a drop out so he only made himself available to take the ball in 3 times. He just edged out BJB in terms of fewest carries.

well whoopdy f*cking doo

Peacock would play on for 3 hours if he was allowed to.

Mcdermott needs to put his foot down and spare him.

That's a joke.

With Kirke's 1 or 2 carries a game, the unused sub, singeltons 1 min 30 second cameos at the end of some games and peacock and leuluai's mammoth stints leeds are practically playing every game with just 13 players.

He did.

He missed the London game and had 2 weeks rest before the saints game.

True, Peacock had only played 30 mins of rugby in the previous 21 days.

So far his big efforts have come against Wire, Hudds and Saints, 3 of the 4 other title contenders. I fully expect something similar when we play Wigan too. Which I think is fine, IF we start seeing him doing those sort of full games and efforts against the lower teams then it's an issue.

But come the play-offs all the remaining teams will be title contenders, can we expect him to be putting full stints in week after week at the seasons end?

If we get a top 4 spot then we have the potential of a week off if we win the first.....plus it's Peacock so I would expect him to pull it off. By that point too their is no thinking about 2/3/4 months down the line, it's all or nothing. And I don't think playing 20 mins less vs Saints in March would effect what he did in Sept/Oct.

I heard part of an interview with radio Leeds on the way home last week, i can't remember which day, and Mac was saying he was looking at keeping his squad fresh throughout the year and London was a targeted game for resting JP.He said managing the likes of JP and Kylie, who of course are getting on in years, was of huge importance for the back end of the year.And whenever he felt he could rest players he will.

It was good to hear.I dont have a problem at all with them both doing big minutes in the games against the top sides as long as they are getting the odd break here and there to recharge.

I think he can. Nothing amazes me with this guy anymore, he is a true machine with awesome levels of fitness, even at his advancing years of age.The International retirement really has given him a new lease of life.

I am a critic of McDermott, but I am happy he has learnt from last season, and is doing exactly what some of us said he should be doing last season. I heard that interview and I have the same opinion as you.

Kylie for me was far and away our best man on Friday, and I am guessing here, but I reckon he is planned to be rested the next match, and that stint on Friday was knowing this.

And what happens if he gets injured the week before the play-offs begin? The likes of Singleton and Achurch need the experience of the bigger games to get them ready for the intensity of play-off rugby.

Losing Peacock to injury is always going to have a massive impact, as there is no 2nd Peacock so cannot be replaced, however, by only really trusting the likes of Singelton and Achurch against the complete gash of superleague, we're not maximising their potential, so when Peacock does eventualy succumb to injury or retirement, Singleton and Achurch could still be underdone.

I agree with you.These players need as much game time and exposure to intense games as we can afford to give them.

That said, i think i have seen enough of the back up squad as a whole to safely say, IMO, our chances of silverware are very,very low without JP.

That unfortunately is very true. So, we need to be doing everything possible to mitigate against his eventual departure.

Having said that, with the general slipping of standards of Superleague, I think we prepare correctly for his departure, we wont be that far away.

I've said the same for the last couple of seasons not just about JP either I think the Coach got it bang on re-rotation against London but against the Giants and ST's his subs in particular were bizarre and imo put too much workload on our pack whilst after the Broncos game ignored that Ward isn't a LC.