Most fair minded people will agree that three very high bombs that Golding dropped were far from easy in fact they were very difficult with great credit to Brough and the swirling stadium currents. But remember he is a young fullback finding his way in what was a very difficult situation and Mac went out of his way to compliment Golding at half time as he also did some good work and one particular difficult take. You obviously have forgotten that Hardaker has dropped a few simpler ones himself this season so critics of Golding should remember this before taking to the keyboard..

Now I would suggest your love of Zak is clouding your judgement if you are suggesting he has been one of our best players this season. Fullbacks usually are big metre makers (as are wingers) because of easy metres in kick returns. The way to best judge this aspect of performance is the with the average metres per carry. Zak has always been in our top 5 and usually around 3rd place for metres per carry. This season he is averaging 5.83m per carry and is in 25th place for Leeds with only McGuire and Baldwinson beneath him! This I think highlights my point about his poor form this year as this is his main strength.

His injury last week was unfortunate but was not the result of a killer pass and had he been in better form he would not have turned his head away from the oncoming traffic and would have sought to drive forward and go to ground.

I think that young players have to be allowed to make some errors as they learn their trade and so I prefer to dwell on the many good things he did in the game including 17 tackles with two of them try saving ones.

Starting could be:
Prop - Galloway
Prop - Garbutt
Loose Cuthbertson/Singleton

Subs
Cuthbertson/Singleton
Mullally

If Cuthbertson is fit next week I can't see him dropping any of the props and going with no interchange hooker - time will tell

I agree I think Golding deserve some slack - he looks a very good player and he can only learn from this. How often will he come up against a kicker as good as Brough?

Let's face it Hardaker is looking for anyone else to catch the high ball but him

I would give Baldwinson a run in place of Singleton who is not doing much these days. Not sure of his minutes but last night only made 4 carries and 18 tackles perhaps he is carrying an injury too.

I don't know I think he's just been lacklustre recently. He has recently become a dad so maybe being a new parent is having an effect on him.

Whatever the reason, if he (or any other prop) is not playing to his full potential then Baldwinson should be given a chance - soon - or he will be following the likes of D.Smith and Mulhern out of the club.

(How long is Galloway's contract for? Is it worth losing Baldwinson for the likes of Galloway?)

Yes and no. Of course you want Baldwinson to play but do you want him starting doing 30+ tackles every week like Galloway is doing?

The same arguments were made in 2012 for Singleton and Kirke/Bailey blocking him. Said then and say often, people need more patience.

Nobody said anything about him starting - IMO Singleton wasted 2/3 years - look at him now he is no great shakes for all that gentle mentoring?

It was asked if we should risk losing Baldwinson for Galloway.

Singleton's struggled this year but so have players who've been here almost 10 years, a player whose current MOS, players with NRL experience. He had a good year last year so can we say if he'd have played more in say 2012/2013 he'd be playing better now or wouldn't have suffered more injuries being thrown in earlier?

One of the worst cases was where Burrow gave a forward pass from DH to JJB well inside our half under no more than the usual DH pressure.
But in his defence Burrow otherwise had his usual busy game.
God knows where we'd be if he was to get injured.

You think it could be worse?

It could be. Whilst we didn't pick up the points in the last 2 games, if we performed in those games like we did against HKR and Wakey then we really are bad.

Not saying the performances have been great or good enough BUT they have improved over the last 3 games especially attitude wise. The annoying thing is its came in time for two away games that over the years have historically always been tough to get much from. If we played like we did last night (or like against Hull & Saints) in the games vs HKR, Wakey, Salford and Cas we'd probably be 8 points better off which like I said is the annoying part.

But that isn't purely down to Burrow. Lilley has had a massive impact also. I would worry more at the moment at been without him, if I was measuring performance wise.

But in terms of points and position wise, it can't get worse whether Burrow is injured or not. Not that I would want to be without him at the moment like.

True.

You can also bet we will get a 100% Wigan at St James Park as usual, no matter what side they put out, very rare we get them at Fridays level against Warrington when they meet us of late.