The pass from McGuire to Smith was 2 to 3 metres forward as well.

It was Smiths decision to leave in 2008 and he should never have been offered a contract to rejoin. Everyone who watched him at RU knew he was fat yet the conditioners appear to have done nothing to stop his trips to Mac Donalds and he still looks like the Michelin man. He has shown nothing to date that would warrant giving him a regular place in the team at whatever position you care to mention. Hopefully he will get the message and improve his fitness and if not McD and GH tell him he is no longer required.
Taxi for Smith!

I rarely bother to post much on here these days but reading your drivel has inspired me!

We'd be over run in the 3/4 if that was our line up. It's far too lightweight, offers very little bringing the ball out of defence and contains 3 players who I believe have never played a first grade game at centre. It's almost going back to the Brian Noble GB selction policy of picking the best 17 players forgetting that 6 of them were loose forwards.

For me Hall is a shoe in at left wing, BJB and Hardaker are competing for the other wing spot and if our esteemed coach feels the need to give Webb a rest I'd happily see one of them play full back.

Ablett has been outstanding at centre, he's clearly a back rower but for this year I'd be tempted to leave him there were all our forward options to stay fit.

Watkins struggled at times at centre earlier in the year but was outstanding on the wing. He clearly needs some time at centre and I'd happily see him play there to try and gain some form (and learn how to defend in a line and make decisions, which is a lot harder than defending on the wing).

Which leaves Delaney and Smith. I'm a Smith fan but purely on form he has to miss out for me, although I'd have no fear chucking him in or be too concerned were he selected come play off time - he has that big game experience.

Delaney offers less in the centre than Ablett in my eyes and if Watkins is starting one of them obviously has to play 2nd row. The only thing that could swing it is if BMcD wants to mix up experience and youth and play Delaney at right centre with a young winger and Watkins at left centre with Hall.

There are so many options I almost feel sorry for our coach...almost.

Oh and Nantwich...

How can Hardaker play in the 3/4s if he's at stand off?

What happened to Smith's stand off career?

Where does Wilson fit it, he's been so unlucky to not get a game all year?

Was that your opinion when he came back a hero and rescued a point for us with 2 tries in his first game back?

Remember this was shortly after the games when Chris Clarkson, Michael Coady and Tom Bush had made wing appearances (I think???)

If you didn't think he was fat when he returned from RU then you need to go to Spec Savers pal. The two tries he scored hardly took any finishing and what has he done since!!!
And your second point is?? Put crap on the wing and sign mediocrity on a 2 and half year contract.

I never said that. But I certainly thought it was a position we needed to strengthen and signing a player mid season who was familiar with the system and had played in many big games for the club appeared to tick a lot of boxes.


No, my second point was outlining how desperate we were for a player capable of playing first grade rugby on the wing - Smith was certainly that. We appeared to have few options with the injuries to Watkins and Donald and the people who stood in were no where near good enough. I'd take 3 time Grand Final mediocrity most days of the week over Coady, Bush and Clarkson

Yes he did but not for another 12 months after signing off with a two-try Grand-Final performance.



See above. How soon we forget. It was the correct decision to bring Smith back to the club (albeit a surprising one given the club's history in this regard) with Watkins' long-term absence and Donald's medium-term injury there was a desperate need for another experienced outside back.

Smith's rescue from the dark side, likely as not, will have been the cheapest 'quality' option open to the club or so it will have seemed to the management at the time.

Edit: Sorry for the repitition of some of Andy R's points (multi-tasking) but they are worth making again anyway.

Ah the Infamous Grand Final Appearances Fallacy

always the last resort of those determined to view current form through rose tinted glasses, and about as convincing as T Blair's claims on WMD.....

Smiffy is good enough to get a gig with the Wakeys/Bradford/Harlequins of this World, maybe even on a good day with either of the Hulls. He is no longer a top level RL player, and rather than keep him as a bit part player at Headingley, he should be given his chance to claim a regular spot elsewhere.

You're just spoiling for a fight



Let me explain as carefully as I can to a man inspired by drivel.

Hardaker is a stand off ..ie the LONGER term. It would have been a good opportunity to offer him that role for a couple of meaningless SL games ( all of them ) to the end of this season. In the SHORTER term ( 2012 ) I would me more happy to see him in the threequarters than the likes of Smith, Ablett or Delaney being there at his expense.

Is there not a contradiction in criticising Noble for selecting players out of position and then championing the " obvious back rower " to play in the centres ??

You're easy to please if you are content with afore said threesome commanding a first team threequarter role: I wonder how much Warrington, Wigan, Saints etc look on in envy ??
Sounds like you have no faith in a club Leeds' size coaching any defensive deficiencies out of the more exciting attacking options my annointed options would provide ?? ? .... Actually you might have a point with the present comedy set up !

Wilson , again, is worth a punt IMO above same said terrible threesome.

Smith DID hold much promise (evasive, no worse a tackler than McGuire and not afraid to try something different ), but as others have also stated, he's a pale fatter shadow of that once rich promise.

Bet you're a civil servant.

Why so sure of this? He has, as far as I know, never played a senior game there, even for Fev. He may have played there in his junior days, but that might just have been a case of putting your best player in a pivotal position.

He looks every inch and outside back to me.

Anyone remember the switch of another young winger into the stand-off role (IIRC it may he coincided with him becoming captain)?

A move based on the fact he'd played a chunk of his junior rugby at St John Fisher in the position, although he'd never played there before in his professional career.

I seem to remember it lasting about half a dozen games before coach and player conceded it had been pretty much a disaster and he reverted back to his previous position.

(No doubt tvoc will correct my failing memory on the facts above...

)

Out of interest, I wonder what nantwichexile has seen of Hardaker to lead him to believe that he's got either a kicking game, the ability to put runners through gaps or the rugby brain to lead a team around the field?

No doubt.

The failed experiment was confined to the opening 4 regular rounds of the SL Era in 1996 under coach Bell. It was never repeated for the future Leeds captain and assistant coach.

Gah! I'd forgotten about that. The full-back experiment was bad enough, and seemed to last forever.

I remember getting a text from a mate while I was on holiday half way through the season to tell me that said former St John Fisher junior and future Rhinos captain had just evaded a would-be tackler for the first time that year....

Make way for the human milkfloat!

Hardaker may turn out to be a stand off. He looks to have a rugby brain. But he's not going to start there for Leeds this season or next. Even if that was the 'long-term' plan you'd start by giving him the odd game under low pressure, not fling him the No 6 shirt and watch him (probably) sink without trace.

Nantwich listens to the voices in his head. They're telling him Hardaker is a stand off. He finds a PC and posts it.

Sometimes they tell him to burn things.

Yes, but Smith actually played very well in those GF appearances and didn't just make up the numbers. He did so in 3 different positions.

Yep. There is a difference between playing in a Grand FInal and having a real influence on the outcome.

2007 he played on the wing while still relatively inexperienced, looked solid and added some gloss with a try.

2008, came in for our injured full back amid much wailing and gnashing of teeth in the media on our behalf and scored once and kicked a vital (if slightly streaky....) 40-20 in a man of the match performance.

2009, two of our 3 tries, including the equaliser and the clincher.

That's a Grand Final record to match almost anyone's to be honest. No Grand Final fallacy here.

I'm pretty sure that someone said Smith has a happy knack of scoring tries in important games...

It would be plain dumb to ditch him now, so I can see our current coach doing just that given some of the other crazy decisions he has made this year.

I've said it for a couple of years. There is no fallacy about it, the lad is a proven match winner, and we don't have many of those about.

Smith hasn't been on the best of form since his switch to union, but at the end of 2009 he was the best back in the competition. Every super league club wanted him, and he chose the money route to union.

Luckily for Smith, unlike a lot of his team mates he is still relatively young, and hopefully can regain that form. He doesn't deserve his spot in the side at the moment based on his form, but I would never write him off. Like I said he is a match winner.

Interestingly for nantwichexile, Hardaker has played the last couple of Under 20s games in the centres.

I wonder if that puts him ahead of Aston Wilson?

Not too sure Batley that you'll find a chapter in any coaching manual with the heading "Happy Knack"

As I recall, Bobby Charlton had the same happy knack when it came to toe ending a football, but until I see him pulling on a Man U jersey, then I suspect both Fergie and I will be judging players not on their past, but on their current on field performances.



Indeed, all the accolades given in a couple of the preceding posts, simply highlights Smiffy's lack of form since he returned from his spectacular failure in Union. He's living on past glories, and we cannot afford to carry passengers.

Time to thank him for his efforts of 2/3/4 years ago, free up his space,and start rebuilding the current squad.

Indeed: a dilemma



Problem with some of you guys is you're all utterly devoid of the vivid imagination commensurate with myself.
You're all so transparently envious at your comparative paucity in that area. It's very sad.

Someone out of Smith, Hardaker and BJB will need to have a bash in the centres unless they want to play only when somebody gets injured next season (asuming we don't sign a centre). Hardaker may be a bit skinny at the moment but he could well fill out and fit the bill.