Leigh

[Harry Stottle]

9 minutes ago, yipyee said:

Because they were better on the field? 

Toulouse certainly have a better squad than Leigh this year (and last year going off the games played)

London did well in SL and actually won some games, Leigh are dreadfull and getting pumped week in and week out

Has my learned friend Leyther Matt pointed out have you  actually seen the age of the Toulouse player's this term, they would have struggled as much as Leigh are doing in SL.

[meast]

8 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

To be fair, it seems promised spending on the squad has not materialised. Partly that is due to availability and the times we live in, but partly that is due to not spending and not getting deals over the line. Benji Marshall anyone?

It is a critical point as the ability to spend to recruit a competitive squad was "apparently" seen as the most important aspect of the bids for the 12th placed team.

I think Leigh have been pretty clever, they probably knew they weren't going to compete and so didn't see a point in throwing the chequebook around like last time and maybe do the best they could with what they've got and have another crack in a year or two?

Saying that, they do seem to keep recycling the same players, maybe a fresh start would help them rather than resigning the same players every few years.

[georgeb1]

agree with the above , fans get a chance to see the best in superleague , next season they can enjoy being vitually at the top all season with a very favourable chance of going straight back up  , better to have experienced it than never done it .  good luck leigh .

[Harry Stottle]

14 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Nah H, some clubs aren't deemed worthy of the top tier and that top tier has been added to only by accession of an application (not your club of course, who have been at that appointed top table since 1864, I'm sure if you were a Cumbrian or a Wiltshirite you'd feel differently).

There's nothing wrong with being either traditionalist or club centric with regards to sport of course, they are widely held and valid positions, but its important to recognise when that is the case and not place it on some other factor which is merely symptomatic of that tradition or club centrism.

Traditional or Club Centric doesn't come into it on my take on P&R Tommy, others may disagree with me and do so but it is the way I prefer sport to be played, reward success and penalise failure. And non of your personal 'Hybrid' formulations of ring fencing and exempting certain clubs from relegation whilst others can be subjected to jeopardy playing in the same competition, that is just totally abhorrent.

[Smudger06]

10 minutes ago, Harry Stottle said:

Has my learned friend Leyther Matt pointed out have you  actually seen the age of the Toulouse player's this term, they would have struggled as much as Leigh are doing in SL.

I pointed that out on a different thread a couple of weeks ago i think, and got absolutely hammered for it haha.........

[Manfred Mann]

Leigh have a top class winger named Lewis Tierney, who played for Wigan and Catalans. They also have a good centre named Junior Sa'u, and lots of players with Canadian experience. Plus they have a very tough prop, some would say a vicious prop, named Ben Flower who is a Welsh international. Ben Flower we know is no wall flower, because in a Challenge Cup final playing for Wigan he punched a Kiwi named Lance Hohaia so hard in the head, when Hohaia was lying prostrate, unconscious, and defenceless on the pitch, that he Flower was sent off and probably lost Wigan the Cup. Subsequently Hohaia began legal proceedings against Flower for permanent physical injury.

It is a mystery why Leigh have not done so much better.

[Harry Stottle]

13 minutes ago, meast said:

Agreed, but they should have won at our place and should really have beaten Wakefield on the last day, they were right in the mix to stay up until the last minute of the season, still weren't good enough though.

But that is precisely the point I am making Meast, if Saints had not been on a squad rotation excersize twice the season's end would not of come about the 4 points they gained would have been 4 points adrift on the League table.

[Cheadle Leyther]

12 hours ago, GUBRATS said:

Ryan has been playing full back , only missing yesterday , so if he's playing HB , who are you playing at full back for those 4/5 games ? , Is Ryan a proven SL quality HB ?

The point I'm making is we have who we have , and are struggling to get those on the pitch , hence Wilde at HB against Wigan , along with several other combinations so far , not conducive to getting us playing well , but that's the way it is 

In nearly all those half back combinations, Reynolds has featured. He has no pace, no tactical kicking nous (one cross field kick in their 20 went backwards yesterday and touch kicking usually only goes 10 metres. With Elliott  at full back, surely Ryan deserves a go.

[Harry Stottle]

3 minutes ago, Manfred Mann said:

Leigh have a top class winger named Lewis Tierney, who played for Wigan and Catalans. They also have a good centre and lots of players with Canadian experience.

It is a mystery why they have not done better.

That is a joke, I am correct in saying that, aren't I.

[Harry Stottle]

1 minute ago, Cheadle Leyther said:

In nearly all those half back combinations, Reynolds has featured. He has no pace, no tactical kicking nous (one cross field kick in their 20 went backwards yesterday and touch kicking usually only goes 10 metres. With Elliott  at full back, surely Ryan deserves a go.

I will reserve judgement on Elliott till I have seen him in a few games. 

[Manfred Mann]

1 minute ago, Harry Stottle said:

That is a joke, I am correct in saying that, aren't I.

Please read the revised post.

[Tommygilf]

1 minute ago, meast said:

I think Leigh have been pretty clever, they probably knew they weren't going to compete and so didn't see a point in throwing the chequebook around like last time and maybe do the best they could with what they've got and have another crack in a year or two?

Saying that, they do seem to keep recycling the same players, maybe a fresh start would help them rather than resigning the same players every few years.

I think clever is being generous. Losing heavily every week is hardly going to help enthuse crowds and presumably Anthony Gelling wasn't exactly the sort of player they had in mind as a leading light in their squad. It wouldn't surprise me if first choice prospective deals have just fallen away to the point they're on 2nd and 3rd choice signings. Unless they knew it would be a closed shop with no relegation announced for this year it seems like the next shot Leigh could be in Super League will be 2023, which really doesn't seem clever at all.

I think they've been taken for a ride and their owners initial hubris and bluster has been called. A shame really for their fans.

[Davo5]

39 minutes ago, Harry Stottle said:

That is a joke, I am correct in saying that, aren't I.

I’m afraid not H but I want to know how I missed Flower punching Hohaia and knocking him out in 2 major finals,I can remember the Grand Final but the Challenge Cup one escapes me.

[Davo5]

1 hour ago, Harry Stottle said:

Has my learned friend Leyther Matt pointed out have you  actually seen the age of the Toulouse player's this term, they would have struggled as much as Leigh are doing in SL.

But they do have more quality despite the age of some players and we don’t know the players they might have attracted if their application was accepted.

Yes they might well have struggled but unlike Leigh I’d still have given them a good chance of finishing above Wakefield/Salford and even Leeds.

[Tommygilf]

24 minutes ago, Harry Stottle said:

Traditional or Club Centric doesn't come into it on my take on P&R Tommy, others may disagree with me and do so but it is the way I prefer sport to be played, reward success and penalise failure. And non of your personal 'Hybrid' formulations of ring fencing and exempting certain clubs from relegation whilst others can be subjected to jeopardy playing in the same competition, that is just totally abhorrent.

Except when it comes to County Cricket, where it is perfectly applicable to have a different approach to RL or Football in your opinion. Promotion by application makes perfect sense there of course, why wouldn't it? 

I'm not a traditionalist regarding sport, I'm open to new ideas and can judge the existing format on its own merits alongside older versions. That is where we differ on this. I'm perfectly happy to consider that opening the county championship to the whole of England and Wales could be worthy on its merits. I'm also willing to consider that consolidating to 8 or 10 elite tier teams may be more beneficial. I'm equally happy to accept the current 18 team model if that has the best case for it.

I wasn't against the recent Football Super League because of tradition. I was against it because it was an objectively bad idea.

I personally don't think the current RL model is sustainable, the problems are somewhat similar in RU too. I'm happy to consider all options regarding that, but won't just revert to a single point from which to base my understanding of tradition (p/r between 2+ unequal divisions being far less traditional in RL than football for example). A older man than yourself might scoff at your decidedly yobbish, soccer following and incredibly modern insistence on P/R, instead believing parallel county based leagues are the real RL tradition.

Like I said, being a traditionalist regarding sport is a perfectly valid position held by many. I could point out however with my historical expertise that really traditions are never static anyway and have never been more fluid in the past 150 years, but that's for another thread! Saying its "British tradition" for promotion and relegation is objectively false however, it's traditional in sections of a few sports and even then it has major caveats. 

[Derwent]

17 hours ago, Padge said:

If Leigh hadn't taken 12th spot then this thread would still exist but it would be about "whoever".

I said on here at the time that Leigh were the only viable option from a financial and Covid perspective and that it would turn out to be a blessing for Toulouse.

Clubs like York who applied would never admit it but I’m pretty sure their applications were for appearances sake and they were mightily relieved when they weren’t chosen.

It was the ultimate poisoned chalice and if Degsy’s ego wasn’t so big he’d have realised that too. Leigh are in SL to massage his ego, but fair do’s to him at least he backs up his talk with cash and he should at least be given some credit for that.

[yipyee]

1 hour ago, Harry Stottle said:

How many times are you going to use last years results for the sake of your argument, non of Toulouse, Fev or Leigh lost a League game, courtesy of ducking out of the cup Toulouse played one more league game, the test for all three of those teams would have been in the competeing fixtures between them.

You like to say "I think" quite a lot, well here goes, I Think both Leigh and Fev would have beat Toulouse last season.

Agreed its only my opinion and you have yours, the only difference is I acknowledge that you can have a different opinion where as you are forcing yours on me

[yipyee]

1 hour ago, Harry Stottle said:

Has my learned friend Leyther Matt pointed out have you  actually seen the age of the Toulouse player's this term, they would have struggled as much as Leigh are doing in SL.

Nope,

St helens front row: 

LMS 35

Roby 35

Amor 32

Paasi 30

Batchelor 26

No spring chickens, even 'young' batchelor is knocking on a bit (lees is injured)

Last year SL champions with 3 more over 30s in that team too

Grahem 35

Paulo 33

Peyroux 32

 

Other over 30s:

Makinson 30

Naquima 32

Lomax 30 

Coote 31

So age is no barrier.

Leeds had a very old squad and were still SL level

Age of the squad is a myth compared to performance

 

[Rupert Prince]

4 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

We ain't in Australia we are in GB, our sporting ethos is reward and failure in most sports and I wouldn't have it any other way.

I grow tired of this ethos stuff you and others go on about.  But one word springs out, "failure".

[Rupert Prince]

28 minutes ago, Derwent said:

I said on here at the time that Leigh were the only viable option from a financial and Covid perspective and that it would turn out to be a blessing for Toulouse.

Clubs like York who applied would never admit it but I’m pretty sure their applications were for appearances sake and they were mightily relieved when they weren’t chosen.

It was the ultimate poisoned chalice and if Degsy’s ego wasn’t so big he’d have realised that too. Leigh are in SL to massage his ego, but fair do’s to him at least he backs up his talk with cash and he should at least be given some credit for that.

You have to be in it to win it. 

Leigh may get relegated, assuming there is any relegation.  If they do it may be they never had a chance, or maybe they mismanaged their procurement and simply blew it .

On the other hand, there is a long way to go in the season.  They may stay up.  But of course they would have never never never in a month of Sunday's have stayed up if they had stayed in the Championship and not SL.

And who knows what the relegation and promotion situation might be ...  and there is no guarantee at all that finishing top in the Championship would win you promotion.  I believe there is a play off, and finishing top by say 6 points or 16 means nothing if to then get knocked out of the play offs.

So you pay your money and you takes the chance... 

[GUBRATS]

6 hours ago, Tommygilf said:

 

Saying you "want the most competitive team" is afterall exactly what you would say if you wanted to pretend it wasn't about who would take the least money.

Tin foil hat time I see 

[Manfred Mann]

2 hours ago, Davo5 said:

I’m afraid not H but I want to know how I missed Flower punching Hohaia and knocking him out in 2 major finals,I can remember the Grand Final but the Challenge Cup one escapes me.

[David Dockhouse Host]

Journey players has been mentioned. This has been given as a reason against Pro/releg, as teams coming up sign the same players, never really building for the future.

 

If Leigh had been assured of at least 3 years in SL would their recruitment be different? Would they give longer contracts etc

 

[GUBRATS]

4 hours ago, meast said:

Those people who claim Toulouse and Featherstone would fare better than Leigh on the pitch, on what basis?

Leigh fans thought they'd be challenging for the play offs when they came up last time, based on smashing part time teams, and although to be fair, they were fairly competitive, they were never in any danger of being strong enough to not be bottom 2 or 3.

People claimed Toronto would be pushing for a spot at old Trafford based on smashing part time teams, yet they were crushed in every game, apart from a certain cup game.

London, although very competitive in a lot of games still weren't good enough to not finish bottom.

So why do people think Toulouse or Featherstone would be winning games in super league?

Because it suits their agenda , and it gives them the opportunity to have a pop at Leigh , and they wouldn't want to miss that , would they ? 

As we've pointed out , 6 different HB combinations in 7 games , 4 different Full backs , struggling for props , all due to injuries , even last time we brought in Mortimer and Langi for the run in , both were injured after 2 games , it's what happens to us every time we get a shot at SL

[GUBRATS]

4 hours ago, yipyee said:

Because they were better on the field? 

Toulouse certainly have a better squad than Leigh this year (and last year going off the games played)

London did well in SL and actually won some games, Leigh are dreadfull and getting pumped week in and week out

Last year Toulouse finished the season with a 100% win record , as did Leigh and Fev , so how is that better ?