It's the weakest spot in the defence and we are horrible at defending it at the moment. It was somewhere that Sinny in his younger days and the likes of Diskin and Buderus covered superbly. Peacock was very agile in defence for a big man and was also great at covering that area. Being a little generous to Falloon the times I have seen him covering the middle he seemed to be on his own covering 10 yard gaps in the middle of two props who can't move sideways. And we used to think Luke Burgess was flat footed, he was like Wayne Sleep compared to Garbutt and Galloway. Happy days.

I am not deliberately missing Ronzy's point. I do not agree regarding marker defense. In each of the last three years (2015, 2014 and 2013) we CONSISTENTLY made the most marker tackles in SL under Mac's tenure. With regard to red zone pressure this could be better but most other sides would say the same. I think only 2 other sides have averaged more points and only 2 sides have scored more tries over Mac's tenure.

Apart from the treble last year Leeds won many plaudits from opposition fans for the attractive style of rugby that we played which is based on less structure to allow the players to use their individual skills with great backing up and offloading. Now if you take out sufficient of those individual skills through retirement and injury and the replacements are not up to it then you have a problem. Which is where we are now.

To change the style and structure takes time and is all the more difficult if you only have half your first choices to work with and some of those selected are unable to train during the week. I have no idea, and I am sure neither do you, exactly what the coaches have tried to do on the training field to overcome the very obvious errors the players are making each week. Why I choose to blame some of the players is that we can see with our own eyes they are guilty of getting the basics wrong which those same so called professional players have been able to get right previously. It is not rocket science and Mac looks mystified as to why they keep making the same errors in matches which they are not doing in training.

We were over reliant on certain players who have not been replaced with sufficient quality which most of you critics failed to spot. BM hasn't the luxury of dropping any of the error brigade as he has to scratch around to get a side out each week. We also now know we have a few overrated players that without our retired leaders are not good enough to step up to the mark.

Adapt or die. Sinfield is gone, burrow and mcguire are past their best and on their way out. Those players were the backbone of that style.

I disagree that Sinfield was the backbone of the style we played most of last year. He was the backbone to efficient professional wins like the job we did on Cas at Wembley or the ultra close playoffs semi's and finals. The stuff we were doing last when we were racking up points, putting scores on Saints, the 2nd half demolishing of Hull and thumping Wire at our place weren't from a style that had Sinfield at the heart of it. Just on regular seasons performances he would've struggled to make my top 10 performers for Leeds last year.

The style we had last year in attack didn't need a fantastic organiser. It did require a lot of effort and energy to keep that style of play up and keep the ball alive. It required quick PTB by ball carriers winning collisions and offloading and a good distributing hooker to keep up the pace and flow of the attack....none of which we are getting now.

That's the annoying thing about our attack this year, it really didn't need Sinfield there to make it work until we got to the crunch games at the end of the year. Sinfield doesn't need to be there for professional RL players to know to kick it on the last tackle. What we did in attack last year during the regular rounds geared towards a style that didn't need Sinfield to hold their hands and guide them through it.

If we finish bottom of the league (after 23 rounds), will BMD be the only coach in any professional sport ever to take a club from winning every domestic trophy available to bottom in one season? (tvoc?)

Ignominious honour that would be.

That's all great. But you've missed what I was saying. I included Burrow and Mcguire with sinfield. They worked in tandom. You under sell sinfield as well, he was quite good at playing what was in front of him over the years, 2 examples from last year off the top of my head the watkins try in 1st half v warrington in the super 8's, watkins try 2nd half hull challenge cup. Look at the amount of times sinfield and mcguire combined in grand finals for kick tries and the like.

Now Juan Cornetto, the resident chief apologist was doing some turd polishing and mentioned Leeds style. I'm pointing out that of the 3 key cogs, one is gone and 2 are on their way out so leeds need to adapt.

Just on Cuthbertson, I'd add that without his offloads he looks very ordinary - underpowered for prop and too slow for second row.

Most of your examples above came from cup or GF's which as I said he was still massively important in the crunch games. But week to week in the league he wasn't so much. Look at the disallowed McGuire try vs Wigan last year. Passed through loads of hands, Sinfield barely involved, doesn't take a great organiser or structure to do. Just plenty of energy and quick ptb's. The persons most key Cuthbertson and Aiton.

I dare say the style of the play we used in attack last year that we're actually missing Aiton more than Sinfield. Their was games early last year when Sinfield missed or Saints way when he started on the bench that we didn't lose our style. When we lost Aiton we lost it completely but managed to drag ourselves over the line.

The way we attacked last year wasn't reliant on Sinfield. It was reliant on winning collisions and getting quick PTB's with good quick distribution from a proper hooker. The reason Cuthbertson isn't going as well isn't because teams have suddenly worked out that you need to stop him offloading (they'll have known that several games into last year) it because he's lost Aiton who he had a great combination with. Who helped us win collisions with his dummy half work and distribution which in turn let the likes of Cuthbertson run at less settled defences and get his arm free more easily and most times when he did Aiton was backing up to catch the offload and start the second wave of the attack.

The way we attacked last year is only really do-able off winning collisions and good speed PTB's letting us go at less organised defensive lines and that's more down to the absence of a good quality 9 that we aren't getting close to that.

That all sounds very convincing, until you realise that Aiton missed a good portion of the season. To my mind, (I don't rely on stats) the vast majority of our plays ran through either Sinfield or McGuire.

I know you like illustration so, let's consider the Grand Final. One try arising from off the cuff play and that was an structured attack, which had broken down.

Had it not been for the fact we saw what he could do last year, I think he'd be getting some right stick on here. Imagine if this had been his first season with us.

I don't think he's right at all, fitness/injury wise. Still attempting to get through a ton of work.

Add to that, with all respect to their commitment, McGuire and JJB are done.

You wouldn't question JJB's heart, but he's giving lots of soft stuff away. So i'd be in line to agree with you.

He struggled towards the end of 2015 - most put it down to Aiton not be around. This year his form is as at was at the end of 2015 - whether he needs different personnel in the middle to thrive or he flattered to deceive initially who knows?

I agree on JJB, the guy is giving his all as ever but is running on fumes now and doesn't have much left in him. Imo its very harsh to call time on McGuire yet. He has played some of the best rugby of his career over the last few years and has only just returned from injury into a side that is out of form, out of confidence and all over the shop, not really much he can do when his pack are being over run every game.

Its very easy to start writing off half the team as done or not good enough when you go through such bad spells as we are right now but i think the problems run much deeper as a collective team and a club than singling out current individual abilities and performances.

We miss all of last seasons departed players, because none have been adequately replaced. Not all McDermotts fault, but - as with virtually every minute of his 6 years - he's a fantastic scapegoat for anything that goes wrong. How/why Aiton was allowed to leave (especially without a similar replacement lined up) is a shocking error, unless he really wanted to go elsewhere.

Its interesting to read the varying comments about Sinfields role. Whilst not spectacular, the work Sinny did allowed McGuire/Burrow much more freedom, and much less responsibility. Both seem to have struggled without him, and it was always going to be unfair on Sutcliffe (exacerbated by his injury) to expect a seamless transition. In my opinion McGuire should have the captaincy taken off him, in order to get his own game in order.

I personally think McDermott deserves the rest of this season and a decision made then. As with the player replacements though, it has to be the right person for the job - not just somebody who 'will do'

The opinion regarding not replacing Aiton or Sinfield was that their deciding to leave was not expected or planned for as they came as a shock.
We seem to be unlucky that Falloon just hasn't had a good go of it through injury or lack of form, This in turn has led to Burrow yet again playing a huge string of games at hooker which leads to us having small men to cover.

As I have said elsewhere we really need to sign a top class hooker for 2017 and if possible an organising HB and re sign Ferres if we can.
Regarding departures Achurch is reportedly a big one but I also think we need to let go of one of Delaney or JJB and if we signed a good HB and i'd want to move Burrow to a coaching role with the youngsters/U19.

If Ferres stays he'll take up a chunk of Achurch's salary. That means any other new players would have to be at the expense of departures. I'm not disagreeing on the likes of JJB and Delaney, but I'd definitely hope they are given the chance to retire gracefully (albeit they may need some frank conversations with GH and co) rather than being given the heave ho and ending up playing elsewhere.

Aiton played every single regular season game, only starting once on the bench and often seeing Burrow not even get on until the 2nd half. Played in every round of the cup except the final and played about 50 mins of the opening Super 8's game vs Warrington before he broke his arm.

Whilst in some ways Ryan Hall's try will always be thought of as the thing that won us the LLS. What really did it (and got us the vital home advantage in the playoffs) was winning 10 of the opening 11 games. Aiton was one of our top 3 performers in that spell alongside Cuthbertson. Many forget because of how things ended but Sinfield was probably our poorest player in the opening 5 rounds before he got injured and seemed to be struggling to go with this new attacking style whereas other players were thriving under it.

Like I said the platform for last year's success was those opening 11 games. Sinfield was poor in the first 5, missed the next 3 through injury (impressive wins vs Cas and Catalans away and Wigan) and came off the bench at Saints when we'd already stormed into a big lead and Sutcliffe was having a big game and Burrow found very little game time also at this point (think he only got on with 10 mins left vs Cas). We racked up 362 points in those games at an average of almost 33 with only Warrington keeping us under 26 points. So it can be done attack wise without him.....ok maybe not enough to win titles come crunch games but definitely a hell of a lot better than what we've done so far and to go from highest points scorers to lowest.

With regards to letting go players how do you do that when they are contracted if the player doesnt want to go??? Sure you can pay them off but that counts on your salary cap still meaning you cant replace the player.

Its easy to say get rid of Delaney etc but the reality is a lot different.

Fair enough, but McGuire's career has been mainly supporting breaks and gassing people.

He's never had a kicking game to write home about and he's not a particularly creative player.

Plus he's 34 now and not getting any faster - and his knees are screwed - much like JJB.

Again - totally appreciate the commitment and even the absolute need to pull a wage - but id much like to see my heroes of RL not hobbling around Leeds in the next 10+ years because their bodies fell apart...

How can you say that. Strange to select these two out of the under performing squad.

McGuire has only played 3 or 4 games this year and last season was one of the best if not the best. JJB returned from serious injury in March and has been one of our best performers and top tackler. He must be averaging around 40 tackles per game (many one on one) and despite missing the first part of the season is ahead of the likes of Bateman and only 23 behind Chris Hill in overall 10th spot. Someone unfairly commented that JJB is running on fumes.....well he could do to waft a few few of these Castrol R type fumes around the dressing room and get some more energy into his younger team mates.

Of course we have to plan for their replacements but there are several others that I would be looking to replace before theses two.

Because everyone expected McGuire to be able to turn it all around on his own - and was probably rushed back.

That amount of pressure is not good for anyone - let alone an injury prone player.

Any player returning from a long term injury will take time to gain match fitness and form. McGuire deserves this time and has a few season left him yet. Same goes for JJB although he shouldn't have to be doing other peoples tackling at his age.

Unlikely there will be many if any regretting the pro-active approach taken by Hudgell tonight after they destroyed their former coach's new club away from home.

Both Hull KR and Wakefield's record since changing coach far better than Leeds' who are stubbornly sticking with theirs.