Yes I'm leathered!! Ratch was, usual. Fantastic and completely in tune with his colleagues. Not once did he look like he was playing for himself or shying away from taking the line on! Keep ratch he will forever flatter to deceive! Smith dropped a lot of gonads today and stef is his biggest!

huh?

You can drink a lot of beer between midday and midnight hey?

Whoever thinks that Mcguires pass was forward is crazy. It blatantly when back. I totally expect sour grapes from you lot. It's what you are known for.

I'm a Leeds fan. I think the pass was slightly forward.

A sensible summary and quite right.no need for the knee jerking,you didn't play at you're best but still could have got the win had the ball stuck.

You still have an excellent squad and are in with a very good shot at OT again imo.

You are quite correct , there is nothing to separate us and the wire. I posted on our site this week ,that I could not forecast which rhinos team would turn up.
Unfortunately for you it was Jamie Peacock accompanied with the rhinos. He wiped the floor with your forwards. What's with Westwood , I really rate him as a top class forward, at the moment he is way off the player he used to be.

You must have been that leathered that you didn't actually watch the game then.....

Some fans don't rate ratchford, some fans don't rate myler. However, smith seems to rate them both. If he wants to accommodate both of them and bridge i'm not really bothered how he does it, but bridge HAS to play in the halves. Nobody can argue with that based on this seasons performances.

Neither did I. Spent two hours waiting for a pie and a pint.

My summary: the game was lost by us, we didn't turn up and their forwards dominated us. If we had won it wouldn't have felt just. The positive I can take away from it is that we didn't roll over and admit defeat.

TS made some terrible selection decisions, namely the HB pairings. You can argue that it wasn't the game to be experimenting in but what's the one trophy we haven't won yet?

If we had gone on to win the CC this year and then got knocked out of the playoffs, would the taunts from other fans be any different to if we now go on and get knocked out of the playoffs? Sure we'd have had a trophy, and we'd have been over the moon, but we'd still not be 'champions'.

Considering who we lost preseason and the start we had this season, reaching the last 4 was more than enough for me, I expected us to lose to KR way back when.

If we put in a couple of strong performances in our remaining games and have a decent run in the playoffs we can then start preparing for next season.

With Sims coming over and an announcement due this week (hopefully Clark) and the youth we've bloodied this year, we'll be competing for honours for years to come and I couldn't ask for more.

Great summary Vespid. My thoughts exactly about the game and pre season thoughts.
Apart from our own mistakes, Leeds were off their defensive line quickly, which we weren't, and smothered our forwards. It wouldn't really have mattered which half back pairing we had as the forwards failed to make much of an impact, especially in the first half.
Must say, I wasn't happy with some of the officiating or that dreadfully small screen at Langtree Park, but we weren't at the races in the first half and I was happy that it was only 14 nil at half time.
The encouraging thing is that we could still have won it despite our mistakes.
At least it wasn't Ormsby's fault that 3 Leeds tries came down our right side.

All these threads about how the team isn't working and certain players need to leave is testament to our fans' lack of faith. A month ago this team was made of solid gold and we were on for all 3 trophies then we have a few poor performances and some are calling for TS to go (again) and to ship half the team out!

I prefer to keep my opinions the same, based on facts. The facts being we're a "team in transition" that has done tremendously well to be where we are at this stage in the season.

TS is experimenting with what he's got. We accepted this at the start of the season as we weren't expecting any honours but as soon as we string some wins together you expect him to pull a GF winning side together from out of thin air and any losses mean either him or the players "aren't up to it" or, my favourite, "are in decline."

They did to us what we did to them at the HJ. Neither us or them could prevent those tactics from working.

I knew after 10 minutes that we'd lose as their aggression and speed off the line was preventing any sort of structure.

Not bothereed with the loss we were hopeless and other people have commented better than you on the closeness of the two teams. my problem (yours is clearly vision) is with the officials.

clearly the game when watched back on TV isn't as badly ref'd as the emotion of the game has you believe.
But the problem for me was highlighted by the forward pass try:

Mcguire is running sideways and passes 2 mtrs before the line, Hall catches it on on the 20 mtr line. It was forward like it or not, and My initial reaction being in line with it at the game was one of relief because I was convinced the whistle would have gone straight away.



I can Swallow that it happens but what I've never understood in many games this season is the use of Referees as touch judges. Robert Hicks the other touchy was easily confident to stop the game to flag a flat ball, marginal at worst from Myler. but the other touchy is that young skinny lad who looks about 16. look at his position ? he was bang infront of that pass did he lack the confidence to stop a semi final try scored by one of the games biggest teams live on BBC.

either way have two refs as touch judges or two out and out touch judges I think one guys experience and the others inexperience was quite unfair it could have gone our way of course but on this occasion it went leeds way. it needs looking at

but good luck to Leeds, and I hope Cas win this afternoon.

i echo that..stood by the guy for so long..plain honest truth hes average at best..ratchy and bridge hb for rest of season

99 times out of a 100 those passes won't be pulled up as being forward. In fact forward passes are one of the things all teams get away with as the refs never seem to want to pull people up for it. The annoying thing about that try(yes, it was slightly forward)is that Bentham seemed to be in the mood for spotting forward passes having pinged us for it three times before that try. If that hadn't been happening i don't think as many people would have been fuming about the try being awarded.

If it's backwards out of the hands it doesn't matter where it lands.

Bentham does have selective vision ,but the best way to sort out all this forward pass controversy is to bring them within the jurisdiction of the video ref so it is on the screen for all to see.

What we have is team of talented individuals not really a cohesive unit and that showed today. There was a desperate need for somebody to step up like a a general and grab the game by the scruff of the neck, calm everybody down and play sensibly.

Of the pivotal players out yesterday, Myler is not a general but is an excellent support player, Ratch is a good individual and should be perhaps either 1 or 13 but sadly at this time he does not offer the same nous as Hodgson at 1 when coming into the line. Bridge is a difficult one as he is arguably the best centre in the club but has shown good efforts at 6 but again he is not a leader who guides the team around the park.

We need a general.

Come on Cas

Out of the passing player's hands...*momentum* rule.....surely if the ball travels forward, it's a forward pass ? Couldn't be simpler. There are so many lines on the pitch nowadays it's easy to judge.

end of the day the better team won...hope todays semi is a cracker...and the final in a couple of weeks is far better than last years bore fest...

Try reading a basic physics book, and look up momentum, inertia, or just get over it. It was a fair pass

The forward pass is a symptom of the flat attack that teams insist on playing these ,it is only logical that some passes may not go where intended. The flat attack that has spawned dummy runners & now the refs obsession with checking incessantly for dummy runner obstruction.

ok ignore the fact Mcgiure is running towards the touchline an not towards the posts i assume without reading a physics book it shouldn't have really traveled so far forward? have a look at Mcguires reaction the second the ball leaves his hand he looks straight at Bentham in fact he has two looks before hall crosses the line he knows.....???

if you didn't think to yourself at the time phew I've seen them given... your not right