I have to be honest, for all your arrogance in the pre match threads, you have been pretty graceful in defeat

Our arrogance has been earned TBF. I never mind anyone being arrogant if they have backed it up on the field, which we have over the last 7 years. Just like I dont mind Saints fans because although they havent won anything for a while, they have been there or there abouts. Its the Wire fans that annoy me. You'd think they have won everything for the last 5 years the way they go on

But at the same time, Leeds fans are knowledgeable in general and we dont mind defeat, especially when a team plays as well as Hull did last night to beat us.

THose who know the game know Leeds were poor.

Lack of direction, poor last tackle options, awful tackling, terrible discipline, lack of go-forward.

Yes, there was effort. Plenty of effort. But effort is the bare minimum we should expect from professionals. You can put in effort whilst playing badly.

As for "can't wait for the playoffs" then they will have to improve significantly on last years garbage. I've read people typing that Leeds winning it from 5th has spoiled the playoffs but actually Leeds vs Warrington saved the Playoffs last year because until that point they had been dreadful, poorer than pre season.

great game, our best performance of the year imo, still think leeds will be there or thereabouts come play offs

Going into the game I thought that it could go either way. It was my opinion that Leeds had a better set of threequarters but Hull had a better set of forwards, although many were coming back from injury. I thought that if the returning FC players fit back into the side and weren't rusty then we would have a good shot, and that's what happened because I thought that the FC pack generally dominated the Leeds pack which is what won FC the game. It probably helped that we had an 'extra' forward in Whiting because, although he was named at Stand Off, he was told to play as an extra back rower.

I thought that Peacock was the standout forward for Leeds, he made many good metres and his offloads caused several problems, but he didn't have much help as a lot of your other forwards were pretty anonymous.

What didn't help you guys was that your players seemed to get quite wound up towards the end and so instead of playing sensibly they were making errors or going in for a hit rather than ensuring they made a good tackle.

I was surprised at how little of the ball Ryan Hall saw. He's a world class player but hardly got any service all night. Maybe this was down to FC's pack being on top but I'm not so sure. There wasn't really much movement towards his wing.

Child made a few dubious decisions, but both teams got them, but I think he also made some good calls too. I know that many of you may be a bit sore about the 'forward pass' for Webb's chance (from where I was sat it looked like a flat pass, not forward) but in my eyes, and probably many FC fans, this evens out as the ball to BJB for his first try was about 2 metres forwards by the time it reached him.

Cracking play for McGuire's try at the end, that was a good move to watch.

I thought that it was a really entertaining game of rugby with a great atmosphere inside the ground.



Hull had several players returning from injury last night that weren't available for the Wigan game. Against Wigan we were missing O'Meley, O'Carroll, Seymour, Aspinwall, and Turner, all of whom featured for FC yesterday. As such we had several inexperienced players in the side for the Wigan match which kind of explains the result, although Wigan played well.



For me, I imagine the top 4 to consist of some combination of Wigan, Wire, Hudds and Catalans, with 5,6,7 being some combination of Hull, Leeds and Saints.

Well said matey - The whinos team are not the "team" they used to be - some of your players believe they are better than they are - but you ARE Champions. The Rhinos were far better when Team Spirit was based on the players who came through together - Sir Kev seems to think he IS Leeds

Great kicker but he needs others to score !!

I'd disagree with that as the passer (Webb) was also two metres forward by the time the ball arrived with Jones-Bishop - would have been more had his momentum not been checked by Crooks - which is why the referee and/or touch-judge were correct to allow the try to stand. Not saying Leeds didn't benefit from other missed forward passes (there was one from Sinfield at dummy half that stood out) just not that one.

Otherwise a perfectly reasonable post.

I thought hull played well,also defended well,we played some good stuff in patches but obviously we needed to do it for eighty minutes.
Overall a fair result, my main concern was some bad tackling,at least Brian Mac
Admitted it in the post match interveiw. One would presume he will be having a quite word !! With certain gentlemen.

Just had a quick look at the League table.... just hanging on to 7th place due to goal difference, and level on points with Bradford FFS.

A tad embarrassing so far this season Mr Caddick. Perhaps it's time you and Garry sat down, and had a friendly chat about what sort of rugby you'd like to see being played at Headingley?

Agreed - this season has been a catalogue of shame every step of the way. We'll never win any trophies having a year like this

My main concern is our coaching team does not seem to know which is our best line up,and which positions certain players should play in.

advice please.
Once all players are available and injury free,what would our best line up be.

loving the spin,
your biggest defeat of the season to Hull was by 12pts but you've decided it was only 6.I think i will change our massive defeat to wigan as a hard fought 1pt loss

1. Webb
2. BJB
3. Watkins
4. Hardaker
5. Hall
6. Sinfield
7. McGuire
8. Leuluai
9. Lunt
10. Peacock
11. JJB
12. Delaney
13. Ablett

14. Burrow
15. Griffin
16. Bailey
17. Clarkson/Kirke/Moore

I've seen us play worse and win. Hull played well. My biggest concern (some missed tackles apart) was how sluggish and hesitant we were moving the ball out wide, particularly to the right. A lot of that was due to lost collisions and Hull's line speed, but if you want to be at the top you've got to deal with that. Looked pretty toothless in the second half.

I will confess to not having noticed the Ablett incident (I was trying to do two things at once and am not good at multi-tasking) but will stick to my point made after the Hock incident - as a general rule, if there is a deliberate eye gouge, 8 matches is not sufficient in my opinion.

Yup. Leeds' execution with ball in hand was poor (a platform wasn't laid and the balls out wide were more in hope than anything). Hull absorbed Leeds' threat well and their kicking game hacked us to death. They kept us boxed in and played the percentages. In defence we were awful, they had the momentum constantly it felt. Far too many missed tackles and lost collisions.

Leeds' 2 scores in the first half, showed that if we got down that end enough we would score. We just weren't down there long enough. But the 2nd half improvement didn't occur and the scoreboard blew out in the end. Frustration seemed to beat us more than anything.

We looked tired. My big question is why has there been no rotation.

I would like to see for a few games at least,trying with the traditional format of McGuire and burrows at half backs.with sinfield at loose forward.

JJB for Bailey?

For me Hull played well and deserved their win. I'm not sure I buy the 'they would have beaten anyone' line. When we got beaten by Saints yes, but there was not anything like that level of performance from Hull. We weren't as awful as we usually are when we lose, but we certainly weren't on song.

I think Leeds are still in a better position form-wise than they were this time last year. Hull had to respond after Wigan gave them a hell of a beating, and they also had an extra week to prepare. It was that freshness that gave them the edge IMO, in addition to executing a solid gameplan for 80 minutes.

A few individual performances disappointed me.

I don't see what Clarkson is bringing to the team any more. Kirke is actually stepping it up now but I have the feeling Clarkson is more deserving of criticism at the moment - I haven't seen his stats so maybe he's doing the unglamorous work that doesn't stand out.

Lunt was poor, making a couple of seemingly unforced errors that were pretty costly, and lacking the penetration showed against the Catalans - perhaps the latter just a case of the forwards not laying the platform... He did look worryingly vulnerable though, perhaps giving some indication to why Hudds don't see him as a priority.

That was the worst performance from Hardaker I have seen this season. He really needs to sort out his passing to Hall, but I also had the feeling Leeds had decided to target the right where young Crooks seemed to be making a few defensive blunders in the first half. This was the first time in a while Hardaker didn't look to be as much of a threat with the ball, and he seemed to be a bit clumsy in defence (falling over other players, going for the ankle tap on Briscoe too soon when he might have been better served trying to chase him down, etc).

On a more positive note, I thought Lee Smith injected himself well and really offered something different from the bench - definitely deserves more time in this role. Ablett, Delaney and Peacock all impressed. Some nice touches from Webb and McGuire, but not regularly enough.

We are still missing Buderus - both in terms of his distribution (Lunt seemed to offer this before) and leading of the defensive line. Obviously Burrow, Watkins and Bailey would have made a difference.

Is the time right for this Leeds side to undergo the kind of transformation that took place during 2000-2001, where a number of young players were brought into the side together to form the core of a successful team going forward?

IMO Leeds are where they will finish at the end of the regular season - 7th. They are the weakest side of the top half of the competition, but will be strong enough over the rest of the season to hold off the likes of Bradford and Hull KR behind them. From that position, and given the deficiencies in the side, they aren't going to go on and win the Grand Final.

It's highly unlikely the run of favourable draws in the Cup will continue even if they get past Leigh, so IMO it's a Cup semi-final and a first round playoff defeat at best in 2012. A perfect opportunity to start refreshing the squad during the off-season.

I think you're being too pessimistic about the current squad's chances, although I reserve the right to join you in this position if we don't see much improvement against the better sides in the next couple of months. I very much doubt the coaching staff or players share this opinion.

At best?

Hmmmm.

Or maybe Leeds will continue to peak at the right time and save their best for when matters.

Wholesale changes now would be called hitting the panic button. I'm glad our coaching staff are in charge rather than some of the would-be Masterplanners round here.