He said he thought he should have put it through the hands. That isn't a criticism of Lilley, it's Sutcliffe saying he would have taken a different decision. Interesting that you've chosen to describe Sutcliffe in such derogatory terms, just to support your opinion. For "not the sharpest tool in the box" he's certainly shown plenty of game intelligence at different times in his career.

Watch it back, there's a decoy runner (Ferres?) who just impedes a sliding defender enough for Lilley to get on his outside shoulder. This attracts in the defender next to McGillvray. At that point, having engaged the defender, Lilley could have passed and given Keinhorst a 2 on 1 with Hall outside him and just McGillvray to beat.

That was the easier option and probably the percentage play, rather than the kick. In hindsight it came up for him. Doesn't mean it was the correct decision to make at the time.

The way Hall played on Friday perhaps the kick for Keinhorst was the percentage play after all.

The greatest English half-backs I've seen were Alex Murphy and Roger Millward, they were both crafty with the ball and devastating runners when a gap appeared.

To be both as a teenager is rare and perhaps asking too much but without some basic pace I think he's unlikely to survive long enough to develop the requisite skills at this level.

If you ever discover the capability for looking outside the Rhinos/SL bubble of mediocrity in your assessment of players, feel free to engage me in discussion. Moreover, if you discover any evidence of Sinfield's world class attributes and stellar international career, please do let me know.

7 grand finals, 2 CC, 3 LLS, 3 MofM awards in finals, highest ever Leeds top scorer, highest ever SL top score, highest ever England top scorer, and a golden boot... enough attributes?
No English player has had a stellar international career since like the 70s because of the dominance of Australia
His kicking, big game performance, organisation and leadership were second to none on his day
Good effort mate anyway

Thurston and Cronk and Foran are about as quick as Lilly, nothing to worry about imo

Those three players have a huge skill set to compensate - Lilley is playing in an inferior competition which will help but to compare him to Thurston/Cronk etc is stretching a point.

I agree, he had his moments but not enough to regard him a success on the International stage unfortunately.

He was playing during an era of pretty poor England/GB sides though (2007-2012 we were particularly bad as a group imo), who were up against at times fantastic Aussie teams with the Queensland spine in their pomp, just something i think should be taken into consideration.Put Sinfield in that Aussie team i have no doubt he would have shone but he just didn't have the players around him, and Sinfield's game isn't built around virtuoso individualism. I also thought he was pretty good during his swansong the 2013 WC (last play aside) when we had a capable team who could get on the front foot which highlights what he may have been able to produce in years past had he had the personnel around him. All, if's buts and maybe's i know but things that need to be considered imo.

Kev won the golden boot. The man is legit. The best ever.

Thurstons breakout year was when he was 23, so was Cronks, lets see what Lilly's skill set is then, or is he already written off in your eyes?

Regaurding Sinfield, its a bit stupid to say you cant rate him as an all time great because he didnt play in the NRL, was Stacey Jones not a great because he never played origin?
Like I said previously, there is noone who has had a particualry good international career for England as the team was poorly coached and players were pushed in and out and into different positions
the fact he has caps at 6, 7, 9. 12, and 13 shows that
Yet, he still managed to captain his country, get a decent amount of caps, and become England highest EVER points scorer so it wasnt too shabby eh?

I said Sutty did not criticise Lilley. You saidAndy Gilder wroteother than for that one piece of decision making, an opinion shared by his half back partner at the touchscreen after the game by the way - I'd be grateful.[/i

You did criticise Lilley and stated your opinion was shared by his half back partner at the touchscreen- just to support your opinion. You now have U-turned and agree with me that Sutty was not making a criticism of Lilley. In fact I took it to be a self-effacing comment, meaning he (like you) wouldn't have spotted the kicking option that Lilley took.

Having watched other players at the touchscreen including Thurston the other week, it is fair comment to say that Sutcliffe came over well below the standard set by the others. Now this may have been due to nerves or not as the case maybe but his comment shows the option he would have taken which has been rather like his play to date just moving the ball on with little variety. So my comment is valid.




I have watched it back several times to check my opinion before posting. If you care to go through the whole sequence pausing second by second you will see that the defender inside McGillvray is standing legs apart and able to tackle Keinhorst right up until Lilley actually kicks the ball. So as I said it was the actual kick that engaged the defender and made it a 2 on 1 creating the space for Keinhorst to touch down.

You had stated there was a 3 on 2 which there never was. Glad to see you now agree with me that Lilley created a 2 on 1 by his run and kick.




Creative players have to make split second decisions to open up defenses which sometimes do not come off. What Lilley did shows a good rugby brain who used the decoy runner to continue a diagonal run to create options. The first option could have been to dummy and try and score himself but he did not have the pace and in any case the sliding defender had appeared outside our blocker and it was at that stage 3 on 3. (4.08 on the video highlights) So Lilley's choice was reduced to a pass or a kick. As it was 3 on 3 Lilley chose the kick which as he did it drew the middle defender of the 3 leaving space for Keinhorst to score.

You say the easy option was to pass, which is what Sutty would have done. But if you go through frame by frame you will see that the defender was only drawn as Lilley made the kick. Had the defender been drawn enough for Lilley to make a pass then the defender would have blocked the space for the kick.

So I maintain Lilley made the correct split second brave decision which is what I expect from a good half back and why despite his lack of pace he has some class.

And black is once again white. I'll leave it there. Life's too short to try and sustain any kind of discussion with some people.

You made a critical comment of Lilley that I challenged. I have provided the evidence which shows your critical opinion of Lilley to be harsh or even wrong on this occasion. Sorry you only prefer to sustain discussions with those that agree with you. I will leave it for others to check out the video.

With all this talk of the speed of half backs, does anybody actually have any timings of the current crop over a distance compared to the likes of Burrow and Mcguire ten years ago? A significant difference may be that the relative speed of other players has increased more than the backs. Most people acknowledge the pace of the game has increased across the park so to keep the same speed difference between backs and forwards would not be possible.

When Mcguire and Burrow first made their appearances, they were still playing against other players who will have started their careers who started as semi-pros with other occupations and even much more recently (and still probably going on) we have seen full time players become full time profesionals. I would be supprised if there were more than a handful of players now who havent come up through the ranks who have had to take on other jobs to make ends meet.

Over the years backs have got relatively slower or others have got relatively faster and the game has once again reached a point where all half-backs can no longer rely on speed as much as they have previously been able to do and over the next five years we will see another shift in the way the game is played.