Although its early days my saints prediction is not looking good, granted they have injuries but the team structure over at saints does not look adequate . Similar at hull,they looked clueless at widnes apart from the winger lineham he looks like he could be a superb winger. Amusingly some of their fans are calling for gentle to go, I thought he was the one who was going to bring about a new dawn . Anyway it's early days and its all good fun.

Indeed it is.

The season is usually tricky to call this early as teams are generally able to field their strongest line-ups (helping to create upsets) but as the injuries start to bite the cream will rise to the top and the natural order will likely as not be re-established.

Leeds appear focussed at this point but their post WCC slump didn't kick in till round eight last year. Then they lost to St Helens (A), Huddersfield (H) and Bradford (A) in rounds eight, nine and ten. This season they have Wakefield (A), Bradford (H) and Catalans (A) and it's the Easter period.

Let's see if coach McDermott has made the neccesary adjustments to take something more from those rounds then they managed last year.

You always know it's too early to make any judgments whenever Huddersfield are enjoying their brief early visit to the top of the table.

I was torn between Leeds' overall decent record post WCC fixtures and Leeds' recent surrender record when opposing St Helens away.

I thought St Helens under-performed those results and their previous week at Odsal.

The game was close but dire, reminded me of Rugby Union. Glad I weren't witnessing it as a neutral.

This year they get the pleasure of sitting on top of the pile whilst looking back in misery at defeat in a none performance.

Nice.

Just seen the stats and remarkable ones for Delaney who topped our tackle count with 39 backed up with 142 metres and 18 carries... some effort. JJB with 34 tackles, Sinfield with 31 were good but special mention to Ward who put in 30 tackles despite being on for a little over half the game. Burrow was our top tackle buster with 6 and a healthy 149 metres

Peacock's 190 metres from 21 carries is worth a mention too.

And who in today's YEP describes his own performance as "disappointing".

Certainly didn't cover himself in glory in the opening minutes, one dropped ball and a penalty from memory(?), but seemed to go ok after that.

As an aside on the comments about Ablett getting no change out of Percival, the field position for Leuluai's try comes off the back of Ablett fending the youngster and making a 30 yard break into Saints territory

Did they all come in that little run that lead to Hall's 2nd half try?

Stop that. You know that because Ablett was in our right centre and percival made a few late breaks in their left centre that equates to him dominating Ablett notwithstanding that centres rarely defend in the centre anyway.

That's a high count for the starting stand-off to have to make - it's almost as if that in addition to running the offensive game he's having to make up for a defensive deficiency elewhere.

Just as well he's got some broad shoulders.

Roby made 51 tackles, if that's what you mean, the same nunber Clark made for Cad the week before.

Not sure I entirely trust the stats, but they have Vickery making 7 tackles, with 4 misses and 2 errors. Find myself willing him to do well at least in the basics, in the way I would an in-at-the-deep-end union convert in the 80s. Currently looking more Rombo than Offiah.

There was also the knock on in the 12th minute when he got smashed by Manu.



Probably owed Leeds that one after his poor defensive read contributed to Saints opening try, although in fairness Lomax should still have been stopped. Vickery backed off then turned his back on the ball carrier but he was covering centre and wing, Watkins also anticipating a ball to the left got bumped off and the over-stretched Sinfield was too late/got carried over. Leeds were always a man short on the right as once again McGuire and Burrow were holding hands together wide on the left.

Perhaps even more disappointing from a preparation point of view that try mirrored Lomax's opener of three at Odsal last week so Leeds should have been able to anticipate the dummy and straightening line that had undone Bradford just the week before.

__________



I'm waiting to see his try celebration shuffle before I'm willing to make those type of comparisons.

Ah, that takes me back to the days when Jamie Lyon was the greatest player in the whole world ever based on 10 minutes of play in a losing team....