Hardaker was awful defensively yesterday. Failed to field kicks 4 times and gave away an interception try. When he could hold the ball he looked OK

Yes and that`s with all due respect to Doncaster against poor opposition in comparison to what lies ahead.

As usual we must agree to differ, I think he slow and ponderous in defence and his lateral movement is poor.

At least we agree about his stamina, which I also think impacts on his defence.

I think it's extremely dangerous to start picking players on the basis of pre-season form. Even discounting the opposition, you would expect Sutcliffe to look like one of the sharpest players on the pitch yesterday as he's played virtually five full games (Wakefield, USA Pioneers, Hunslet, Bradford and yesterday) already this season.

I wouldn't be surprised to see him miss out against Hull KR, as there were times last season when Leeds were playing with four pivots on the pitch and a definite case of too many cooks. Certainly when Delaney returns, Leeds will have a surfeit of back-row options and it's hard to see where Sutcliffe fits in unless it's at the expense of one of Sinfield or McGuire.

I personally would rather see Sutcliffe as the back sub instead of Burrow.
I would move Sinfield to hooker if Aiton cannot play a full 80 and bring Sutcliffe on at 6 alongside McGuire.

What the team should be (IMO)
Hardaker
Briscoe Watkins Moon Hall
Sinfield Sutcliffe

Peacock Aiton Singleton
Ablett Ward
Cuthbertson

Walters Leuluai Burrow Mulherns

What the team will most likely look like:
Hardaker
Briscoe Watkins Moon Hall
Sinfield McGuire

Peacock Aiton Leuluai
Ablett JJB
Cuthbertson

Burrow Singleton Sutcliffe/Ward Walters

Well we know the chances of Sinfield, McGuire and Burrow not getting picked are slim to zero so Aiton is the one under threat long term (I do however think he needs to start vs HKR due to Burrow's lay off and rustiness the other week). As time passes is it a case of Burrow and Sinfield sharing hooking duties and having Sutcliffe in the 17.

What I don't want to see though is Sutcliffe AND either Burrow/Aiton on the bench. I prefer to have a bench that consists of 1 hooker/HB, 2 props and 1 backrow.....and whilst Sutcliffe can play in the backrow and it was useful before to get him gametime and experience in the side, he now has to be only used as a halfback as they've finally decided where his and Ward's futures lay it seems.

As for Achurch I thought his defence did improve last year. However he can't keep needing several games to get up to speed (especially given his injury record). I think 16 of the 17 picks itself vs HKR just by going by who DIDN'T get asked to play vs Doncaster (with the exception of Hardaker who needed some gametime) and its a fight between Sutcliffe, Achurch and Walters if Delaney can't make it for the remaining spot.

The issue with Achurch is that when he's had a couple of games to string together (and started in the second row) he's looked pretty good, but then he gets injured / gets dropped / gets moved to prop and so never gets the chance to string some games together.

I wouldn't be letting him go, especially given that he's only 25 or so and we're going to be losing Kylie, JP & JJB in the next two seasons - we'll need continuity in the pack. For HKR I'd like to see:

1. Hardaker
2. Briscoe
3. Watkins
4. Moon
5. Hall
18. Sutcliffe
13. Sinfield
17. Cuthbertson
9. Aiton
10. Peacock
11. JJB
12. Ablett
14. Ward S

7. Burrow
8. Leuluai
21. Walters
22. Yates

Re-Aiton i wouldn't be surprised or overly bothered if we cut our losses with him moving Sinfield there with Burrow/Ward as bench/back up wouldn't be the worst move we could make opening an HB slot for Sutcliffe with Mags moving to 7.
Imo we can't keep delaying the prep for when the "Golden Generation" do call it a day & by that i mean getting more gametime into the younger lads and rotating ALL of them( not at once) at various points/trying different combinations.
I'd go as far as saying JP,Sinfield ,Mags & Jjb are one heavy injury away from it as it is i.e Cruciate or a big Shoulder injury so i hope that the Club are taking the rellevant steps this year because imo the off season recruitment and last years "Squad Management" was poor.

Ref: B Thaler. Touch J: J Child, P Brooke. In Goal: C Dean, M Hawkes.

Are you prepared to take a few defeats and potentially missing out on the top four to accommodate these younger players? If you are, then I'd suggest you'd be in the minority who won't be howling for Brian McDermott's head if the team finishes sixth again.

It's very rare in sport that blooding young players leads to an improvement in performance. There's normally a dip in performance and results before it starts to pay off.

You could counter that by saying not giving them the time will only come as a problem at a future time anyway.

isnt that the case for most of the players?

I thought id read that Joel Moon wouldn't be fit for the start of the season?

He's already made an appearance in the warm up games mate.