I dont think you can reasonably say that leeds have been the best team in the country for 5 years, in that time they havent even won the majority of the trophis, and some years havent won any trophies. The saints team of 2006 was the best team i have seen in the sl era.

Wouldn,t say they were the best team in 2008 either.

Leeds have won 3 of 5 grand finals (the only trophy which really matters), appearing in the other one, they have been the best team

Thats your opinion smokey and i'm not getting into this again, but at the end of the day all i will say is the best team of the last 5 years in my opinion would be the one that won most trophies and appeared in most finals.

yeah, cos all trophies are worth the same

christ, the challenge cup was never even meant to decide the best team in the country

They have as much value as fans decide they are worth, there is no set value smokey. As it happens i think the cup is a more important trophy as that is a harder trophy to win for me, and i think the league leaders shield is worth more than that as it is harder to win. Some would agree with me, some would disagree, i dont really care, i know which would matter more to me if my team won it. Dont think that i have anything aganst leeds by saying that i said the same when bradford were winning everything too and they are one of the teams i love (or at least i did before SOME of there fans became cocks) .

The point i'm making is that saints have always either been best or second best in all the trophies in the last 5 years, leeds havent always managed to get upto that level. They (saints) have consitantly been up there and have won the most trophies, for me that makes them the best team. You may disagree, niether of us are wrong or right, since the trophies have no set value it doesnt matter, they are worth as much as rl fans value them.

That would be the one where Sinfield threw a pass straight into the hands of an Aussie player. No club bias there then. And in case you're wondering, or for some bizzare reason fail to see the relevance, that means he wouldn't/couldn't go for it because it was a shocking pass that was nowhere near him.

I'm willing to give McGuire a break for the time being (mainly because he's young), but he has to start producing - BIG TIME - for England soon. If he doesn't we should get rid and give one of our other promising youngsters a chance.

Right now he looks two yards short of pace and his support play is a shadow of what it was even in his debut season.

He's 27 next month and he's been playing for Great Britain since 2004 (England A in 2003). Hardly young or inexperienced at this level, he just doesn't produce the goods enough and with Tomkins, Eastmond and Myler all in better form I would give him the elbow for Saturday.

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Myler in better form? hes hardly played in the last 6 months.

FWIW Id keep Tomkins and Mcguire together and put Eastmond centre inside smith on the wing.

Whats Myler done in the last month or two ????

more than Danny McGuire.

His last two England performances have been better than McGuire's, ie he has actually done something positive for the team.

Really, how many Grad Final winning sides has he played an integral part of?

The Australians have little respect for GF winning players. Mainly because they steamroll them with metronomic regularity.

lol just lol

Were playing NZ, HTH

Will people stop suggesting Eastmond at centre ?

Eastmond is not a centre, his defence is suspect, and if he played there then you'd see just as much carnage down the right as we saw on Saturday.

He is an attacking half-back or fullback, not a defensive threequarter. He should be played somewhere that plays to his strengths, not his weaknesses.

The right centre spot needs to be someone whose defence is top notch, whether against NZ or Aus.

Didn't he play Centre when he cam on on Saturday?

yes, and took care of Inglis pretty well a couple of times if I recall.

Think Ben Westwoods presence had a little to do with that too.

He was put on at centre, and was fortunate to be there when the England pack had total ascendency and the Roos were stuck in their own quarter. He didn't have much defending to do as a result, certainly not with the Aussie back line running at him with plenty of time and space as they did in the first half.

But even on the rare occasions they came at him in the second half, you can see he gets knocked off a few times, and even when he keeps hold, he's like Burrow in that he has to tackle a leg and hold on, leaving the offload free. A good defensive centre has to be able to make man-on-man ball-clamping tackles to prevent that. Eastmond can't - he's too small.

I'm a big Eastmond fan, he's from my club, but if we play him a full game at defensive centre against Kiwis or Aussies then we shouldn't expect to do very well down that side.

Who drew with Australia - and should have beaten them.

And the last time we drew with Australia (whilst having the upper hand) was...

HTH.

If you play him in the halves, he would only be defending one space away from where he would be in the centres anyway.

Roy is correct. It was more a case of good fortune rather than cement-like defence which stopped Australia. If you play Eastmond you have to give him some protection. In the centres he's too exposed. The Aussies looked like they hadn't prepared for him playing at centre. The Kiwis will.