But there are people on here who are ALREADY demoting him to 3rd choice hooker next season (moving him to loose forward)

Do you honestly believe that Robys form this season warranted an International place?

Although, Eastmond gave the ball well, it still take the centre to run that line and Bridge has done that consistantly whenever I've seen him play centre for wire. We should definatley stick with him imo.
As for the forward pass, well, its not in the papers is it?


(I was actually stood about 15m away from it all and didn't notice, but I was a touch giddy)

Ill agree with that bit

To be honest, the way Potter played Saints in the second half of this season, I had a hard time figuring out who was off form, who was totally screwed up by the changes (sometimes necessitated by injuries) and who was struggling with the manner of Potter's coaching (which seemed to snuff us out attack-wise). All I know about Roby is that his distribution against the Kiwis was 100% better than it was against the Aussies, and that he does not play a full 80 for Saints so to expect him to do that in an international match is ridiculous. He has had a very specific role at Saints and Smith should have taken that into consideration when choosing him. But Roby can scoot, which did make a difference on Saturday night because he was able to make yards quickly, and he can defend very well, which he did again on Saturday night. With his passing looking better then I can't see why he is being criticised other than because some bitter fans (especially Leeds fans, post-McGuire) feel Saints haven't had a share of the vilification this season.

I've actually just posted on the Wigan site that I can see a good reason for playing Roby in the loose forward position on Saturday for his defensive capabilities, particularly if Smith persists in playing Peacock in the second row.

England were far better going forward with Sinfield at hooker, in the last two games particularly the half backs.

On the Leuluai debate

he actually made more tackles and missed less than Roby on Saturday (League Express stats)

Sinfield however was superb, 32 tackles (top tackle maker) and
missed 0.

As I have said many times, it's not the player (Roby in this case, or the team) it's that scooter hooker role that I don't like.
It works well when you have Isaac Luke who scoots, breaks and passes, but IMO not when the likes of Higham and Roby run make a few yards and get tackled.

Whilst I fully agree with you that the emphasis on the "scoot" based hooker has had detrimental effects to our all round game, I do feel you're lacking some perspective.
Sinfield demonstrated one of the facets you describe when he ran then gave a short pass to Burgess, who then broke for Eastmond's try.

However -
I certainly recall one shocking pass from Sinfield from dummy half which went behind everyone and there was one obvious instance on the 4th when it should have gone wide to Eastmond who was in a good position, but he gave it short to Peacock (the dummy runner).
[iI'm not in anyway bagging Sinfield, just pointing out he's not perfect.[/i

Also, Roby came on after 20 minutes and played hooker for the rest of the game and we won with an impressive performance imo. So he can't have done that badly.

We struggled to play an expansive game throughout the evening, although I'm not sure (without re-watching the game on TV) whether I'd put this down to Roby's questionable distribution or the fact that the Kiwis seemed to do a good job to slow us down on the 4th tackle PTB.

Was that Sinfield, or Shenton?

I think I remember Shenton throwing a very bad pass from dummy half, and immediately thinking it was Sinfield messing up when it wasn't!

I'll hold my hand up if it was.

I dunno mate, I remember a bad pass from Sinfield, and a bad pass from Shenton (IIRC) in the dummy half role which I immediately attributed to Sinfield when I don't think it actually was him.

Was it the one where the dummy half was about 5 or 10m from the Kiwi line, and roughly in the centre of the pitch, then cobbed a rubbish pass about 5m behind the first reciever? It looked like a planned move, but either the first receiver was simply in the wrong place or the pass was pants?

Edit - I'm worried I've got this bass-ackwards now - I was rather drunk watching the game!

Yeah, the ball went from the middle(ish) of the pitch out to the right, behind all the players and Briscoe ended up getting tackled about 25m out. (IIRC)

Its not essential to my point though, so I don't want to dwell on it and and sound like I'm bagging Sinfield.

Gaah, this is going to really bug me until I get to watch a repeat of the match now!

Oh, and when I said right, I meant left.

Sinfield. Stevo commented upon it at the time. Whether Shenton threw a bad one or not I don't know, but the Sinfield one was obvious.

As for Sinfield at hooker, Rogues, I haven't denied he played a good game there. In fact, even on the Leeds board - and this is rare for me - I have praised him for his game at hooker. He should play there again on Saturday. However, Roby has his role and his distribution and passing generally was fine at the weekend. He also made good yards. One example that springs to mind is when Crabtree did an amazing offload from inside a tackle of about five Kiwis strong. Roby read it, was there, and SCOOTED about 15 yards up field. Every member of a team has a role to play and so long as they are playing that role with commitment and to the best of their ability, I don't see how they can be criticised. Nor should they be.