Sinfield is slower than Wellens IMHO.

I'm not bitter about him winning the golden boot. I haven't even mentioned it. What i'm saying is it was a tight game, he wasn't behind a beaten pack, otherwise Leeds would have been hammered. That's just an excuse. Leeds finished their sets in about the same place as Melbourne, it was a fairly even game. Where the the dominating kicks? Why didn't he control the team and push them round the pitch?

I'm simply concerned as an England fan that our captain produced nothing in a WCC final. He's the stand-off, he's meant to create.

Typical RL fans.

Instead of reflecting on what was a really tough game between two top sides, providing a great advert for RL - they decide to take pot shots at a player who they (deep down), would love to have at their club.

Sinfield wasn't at his very best tonight, but that's partly due to Melbourne doing a 'job' on him, and partly down to him setting ridiculous standards in his performances during the playoffs.

Jealousy innit.

That's going to go down well with Leeds fans NOT!

I think the commentators just made that up, they sounded more like buffoons more than experienced knowledgeable commentators.

Err no !

Sinfield is, according to some clowns at a magazine in Yorkshire IIRC, "the Worlds best player".

He clearly isn't .

Where is that 'one-eyed simpleton' emoticon when I need it?

Wouldn't surprise me if Melbourne did actually, how late was that hit by Ryles (I think it was him) on Sinfield in the 1st half? I could've made a cup of tea inbetween the time Sinfield released the ball and the time he got hit.

Yep, they controlled Sinfield and the ruck (thus Burrow); Leeds then only really had their excellent power plays left to throw at them and it wasn't enough.

Spotted McGuire limping at times during the 2nd half, this didn;t help our cause. Also think a lack of impact from the subs bench again hasn't helped, it's something i've mentioned before on SouthStander about the starters having to/or being asked to do too much. Achurch came on, gave away a high shot and then together with McShane fell off Bromwich for their 2nd try. He was quickly hauled off for Peacock to return. who I thought was great but his efforts caught up towards the final minutes.

We seemed to be having some joy attacking their edges from around the halfway line in the first half but in the 2nd didn't really try shifting it wide in the same field position and it was more 'up-the-middle' round that area.

Didn't think he was that bad, him and Mcguire were good in the first half I thought. Overall I thought he got the better of Widdop. To be honest I can see Widdop really struggling when Cronk retires.

Exactly, he wasn't that bad at all.

The guy who started the thread has a clear agenda / club bias / jealousy, pretty obvious really.

If his actual agenda was to flag up his worries about creativity in England's halves, then he'd have mentioned Widdop too.

Pathetic really.

No excuse at all.i said, the best won.

He was controling the team and was TRYING to push them round the pitch.If you did watch the game in detail you would have seen this.in the first twenty minutes or so the Storm defence was right in our faces and our forwards could not make yards whatsoever and it was only our power plays on the last that got us up the pitch.was this KS's fault? the pack was dominated,certainly in that period.I think it took nearly 25 minutes for us to get a set in the Storm 25!

We did have more joy in the second half with some great surges from JP in particular and had a good few sets on their line late on where we couldnt break their defence.Maybe you could say he should have come up with some magic then,or you could just say it was superb defence by a well drilled team.I think we should all pay respect to the latter.Melbourne are a fine team and will take one hell of a side to stop them winning the NRL crown again this year.

It says a lot about the OP and other posters on this thread when they specifically choose to criticise Sinfield for tonight's game.

Much as it may pain me to admit, as a Hull FC supporter (and let's face it, we all hate Leeds), Sinfield is far and away the best thinking British player in the game. There simply is not another player who has his all-round vision and skill sets.

That can only be Canterbury Bulldogs, or South Sydney Rabbitohs or ... Sydney Roosters.

Even if you think he had a poor game, I don't think you can throw "goes missing in big games" at Sinfield. To be honest its thrown at a lot of players unfairly. Everyone has bad games, sometimes in big ones, sometimes in small ones. More people notice, because more people watch big games of course, and they're usually 'big' because the opponents are good meaning less chance to have a stand out performance. Tomkins gets this kind of stuff, but there's no real evidence of going missing in big games vs small games, and even if there were he's young enough for it to be 'small sample error'. Not so Sinfield, but I would say there's no evidence at all that he's any less likely to perform in a big game.

There's a seperate debate to be had about England halves, etc., but if Sinfield is picked on the basis of what you think he can do on a good day, I see no more risk that he'll fall short of that, than any player. Less risk than most actually.

The Halves for Leeds did not do enough or have the impact that they should have on a game.
I barely heard Danny McGuire's name mentioned did he touch the Ball?

Leeds fans are delusional to think Kevin Sinfield qualifies as a good player, hell some school boys are better.

To be honest I wouldn't be looking at Sinfield as the cause of the defeat, the pack was beaten, the game had a similar feeling to the England-Australia final at the 4 Nations. Beaten pack, no room for the half backs to do anything.

The Leeds players that looked good were Hall, Moon and Watkins. If they had BJB & Hardaker I think it would have made all the difference, Melbourne made loads of easy yards down the Leeds right.

Leeds missed a couple of opportunities with dropped balls, they were also gifted a try that had a blatant forward pass in the build up and the Storm appeared to have a perfectly good try chalked off for a forward pass.
It was probably a fair result with the Storm playing at a different level for the first 10 minutes of each half.

We all know Sinfield getting the golden boot is a farce but i would not blame him for leeds not winning the game

Pathetic thread really, Sinfiels was totally marked out of the game (illegally at one point) so didn't have his best game. So those calling for Sinfield to be dropped as England stand off on the basis of this game I presume want Widdop there? And he was far worse than Sinforld last night.

Best team won no complaints. I thought it was a great game, Melbourne were nowhere near their best but on the flip side neither were Leeds, for example how many times do you see burrow drop the ball with the the line begging like last night

I did not think Sinfield was marked out the game at all.
Where was his tactical kicking game, pretty hard to mark that out of a game.
He was not why Leeds lost at all, he did not do much to make them win either.

The slightly late push in the back was nothing compared to the knees in the head on the Storm centre that knocked him senseless.

The reffing was pretty much a joke all night.

I think the problem with Sinfield at international level in coming years could be what happened last night.

He is a great kicker, but marked properly by a fit side and you get a non-kicking Sinfield, which is a greatly diluted product. His kicking is what makes him a good player in my eyes, but like tonight showed if he is controlled he fades into the background.

Also To the poster who singled out McGuire, he didn't look 100% fit to me but to say he had no impact is wrong, for a start he created halls try with a fantastic cut out pass, he also created a few breaks with similar passes throuout the game