Really? If so they were very few and far between.


We are on about Hardaker here aren't we? Y'know, the lad who plays full back? You're not thinking of Ryan Hall?

Hardaker is a superb broken field runner and for that there is a certain amount of physicality required. A good proportion of the breaks he makes are against a retreating defence where he is pin pointing a tired defender and running through him - that requires a certain amount of physicality. Man on man defence he is as good as there is but to stop someone at full pace requires a combination of technique and physical strength - why does Ryan Hall score so many tries even against the best FBs in the world?

Printer is correct in pointing out his personal issues last season and how they may have impacted his form but they were in part self inflicted and that propensity for self destruction should not be discounted when looking at player. He may be great but if he is suspended for 20% of the season that isn't helpful

The second half of the season stats you produced showed his best performances were against 3 of the 4 worst sides in SL he stats against the likes of Saints, Wigan and Catalans weren't so hot? That for me is the real test how does he perform against the best sides?

There really is no hope or pleasing some moribund pessimists on here.

Of all the players' positions that could be considered in need of improvement with a healthier upgrade (halfback and hooker) some have to focus their negativity onto one of our better more valuable players.
As for his skills or supposed lack of them, some of my highlights from last season were Hardaker's beating of Sarginson at HQ, and his beautifully timed tackles on Bowen, Escare and Evans. Physicality indeed

Like you agreed with, the 2nd homophobic incident looked to have impacted his form for those remaining games vs Wigan and Catalans.

Earlier in the year he ran for over 200m vs both, scored one of the best individual tries from a Leeds player this year against Wigan and assisted one vs Catalans.....he also scored twice in the cup win over Saints.

Let's just establish a couple of things before we go around the houses once again.

1. Hardaker is a very good asset for Leeds and I am not suggesting otherwise. Neither am I suggesting we should swop him or drop him.

2. The discussion was about the claim that ZH is the best FB in SL and also that he should be moved up to SO. Therefore my comments should be taken in this context as an alternative view.

3. Fullback is regarded as one of the real key positions and one that presents some of the best attacking opportunities to create position and space for scoring chances. ZH does create good field position but so often this comes to nothing because he chose not to use an overlap or chose to try and beat another man when a pass would have been better for the team.

3. My use of the word physicality is not meant to denigrate ZH. Rugby is one of the most physical games in the world so having physicality is a great asset. Hardaker's fullback style is in the same mould as Kenny (Bucket) Thornett one of my boyhood heros in our first championship winning side in 1961. He is also in the mould of Wellans another full back whose game is based on physicality but who developed the creative side of his game. However as my rugby experience and tastes matured, I came to appreciate the subtler fullback skills of the likes of ET, Homes, Harris, Webb, Slater & Inglis ( the latter combines great physicality with great skill too). I do believe that ZH's current game is based on great physicality and very good work rate but is deficient in other key skills IMO.




My criticism of his defense is a bit picky and was not in my original comments (see point 2 above)







Stats per game is interesting but without knowing the minutes played is flawed.
Eg1

I agree on the first point but have reservations regarding you other points. We shall see,

im not gonna address all of your post, just this bit

not really, we're talking about full backs arent we, so i'd assume most full backs played full back for all the game.
wouldnt it follow that stats per game would make sense then?

if you've picked players who played lots of game time in other positions, then its just a bad comparison isnt it.
i guess 'stats per game' are as flawed as comparing a full backs stats to a rotational hooker's in an effort to make some weird point about Hardaker.

if youre going to do 'stats per carry' why dont you at least include the number of carries and give them some context.

Hardaker made 400 carries, scored 8 tries and made 13 try assists
Russell made 382 carries, scored 3 tries and made 3 try assists

his attacking efficiency shouldnt be conisdered independant of his work rate and role in the team.


also, you said you agreed with Sal that there are 3/4 full backs better than Hardaker in the league
did you agree with him that one was matty russell? lol
if not, could you please name who you think are the better full backs? or did you mean there's 3 or 4 'better passers of the ball' playing at full back in the league?

Good old JC only using stats that back his claim yet the only stat that really counts is what happens over the whole 80 minutes RL is an 80 minute sport not a per carry one.
Also re-him possibly moving to SO he adapted to FB and i personally think he could adapt/develop into a 6 after listening to Daryl Powell and watching the kid since he joined us.
Is he perfect in all facets of the game no but who is in SL?

Everyone on here uses stats that suits their argument that's the skill in debate don't see you picking up on Printer selective use of Zac's better stats at the start of the season when it didn't really matter against his stats at the business end of the season?

So I take it that the points you are not addressing are because you now agree with me on these points!

It will never make sense to put 'per game' stats ahead of 'per carry' stats if you are studying the individual skills aspect of a player. If one player has more opportunities with the ball than another player in a game this has to be taken into consideration. I do not have the number of games played for all the other fullbacks otherwise I would have included these stats too



I didn't pick players especially - I just recorded all those classed as full backs and there are enough of them who were regular fullbacks to prove my point.



It maybe a weird point to those who choose to see Hardaker in the 'Kings new clothes' but the discussion was about Hardaker's lack of passing, kicking and I would add decision making skills and if he had the right skill-set to make a 6.



The stats are available for all to see on the SL website. In my previous post I have converted them to averages to prove my point about Hardakers lack of attacking skills when compared to other FBs in SL.

I note above you choose to publish season figures for just Hardaker and Russell. Why not others? But seeing how you mentioned it lets see how Zak compares?

eg1 Escare made 284 carries, scored 27 tries and made 16 try assists, also compared to Hardaker he made 17 more tackles, one less tackle bust, more than double the clean breaks and more than a metre average metre gain at 9.24m

eg2

Not sure of the point you are making here?




Take a look at the above figures and you will see there is quite a choice who would appear to have better all round attacking credentials in what most coaches see as an attacking position.

I have never put forward Russell as better or worse than Hardaker

I would remind you of my original point which was:
"Most of the other FBs in SL have better try scoring, try assist and clean break averages which is one of the reasons Leeds were below par on attack last season. Sure Hardaker returns the ball strongly but not cleverly enough IMO. It is what you do with the ball that counts"

I think I have provided sufficient back up information to prove my point.

If you look at my last post you will see I have also used the total stats for the season which confirms the same message given in the stats per carry which is that Zak lags behind several other fullbacks when total attacking performances figures and average per carry figures are compared in the three key attacking areas of try scoring, creating tries for others and making clean breaks. That does not make him a bad full back but it does show that he has a lot of improvement to make just to get on an attacking par with several other fullbacks.

Of course he has the time to improve and develop his game and I hope he does.

per carry stats are laughable and i cant be d to even argue over it

you tried to compare Zaks attacking stats to those of a substitute hooker without even noticing LOL
tell me again how we cant compare full-backs stats per game because they all play different minutes?


i didnt put stats other than Hardakers and Russells because they were the ones with a comparable number of carries?


so which 3 or 4 players did you agree were at least as good or better than Hardaker?
or just dodge the question again i guess

If RL was played on a laptop, Football Manager style, then stats would be paramount. It's not. There's more to a performance than the measurables.

That said, have you got any stats on errors, out of interest Juan? Say maybe security under the high ball, or kicks taken on the full? Areas where Hardaker is particularly strong and I would guess he'll compare very favourably to other full backs in the competition. Or are we just selectively using stats that support your point of view again?

You questioned whether he could play well against the better teams like Wigan, Saints and Catalans. I showed he has done.....pretty straight forward.

I think Juan is still a bit bitter because he was the only one who thought BJB should've been FB ahead of Hardaker.