Galloway probably wouldn't get in if Garbutt and Mullally were fit, but he and Peteru would both be ahead in the pecking order of what we ended up having on the bench

These players missing probably wouldn't have a big influence in terms of anything special ball in hand but it's about sharing the workload in the forwards and working as a unit. The likes of Cuthbertson could've done more had he had some bigger and better teammates in the prop position. Not every player in a 17 is there to do something special, some are there to do a role that allows others to be match winners.

By the time Melbourne lost Slater at HT the damage had already been done.

And I don't see anybody saying that Leeds would have won, or denying the size of the gap between NRL and SL, but to say Leeds missing players wouldn't have made any difference is ridiculous and sensationalist.

Printer put it very well - there were some of our better players absolutely gassed from having to do the majority of the graft. Cuthbo, Watkins, Hall, Briscoe, Singo, JJB, Sutcliffe appeared to do a ton of donkey work. With some more able back up forwards, this wouldn't have been so much of a necessity. Melbourne would still have won, comfortably, but we'd have been in the contest for longer. Our 20 mins good spell at the beginning of the game showed we could hang with them, but we tired, and they were efficient, effective and ruthless, as Melbourne always are. They'll beat a number of NRL sides more convincingly throughout the season, that I guarantee. Doesn't alter the fact that NRL is lightyears ahead of SL, but the lads did themselves proud. And put them in the NRL, with the benefit of getting used to being happy required to play high intensity and quality week on week and they'd hold their own - they'd get spanked some weeks, but they'd compete most weeks. There's probably only 3 or 4 teams in SL at best that could do that - the majority would Ben slaughtered week in, week out.

A very good summary of the game Superted

It's very difficult to be critical of Leeds in my opinion. A depleted team, under some unfamiliar rules, against a team that are way better than most NRL teams - let alone SL teams. Yet we made sure they knew they had been in a game. McDermott is right - given a similar salary cap & playing a similar number of games per season as an NRL team - SL teams would easily compete.

What a truly memorable experience, could do without 21 hours in the air to get home though!

Grasping at straws really?
Just stating the obvious in terms of how they'd have added more to us it's not hard to see or understabd that.
Also your happy to dismiss those 2 as average yet make out the serial plodder would have had an impact for them.

I was relatively pleased with the performance. Some people are looking too much at the score line which shows a bigger gap between the teams than is the reality in my opinion.

I don’t just think that about this game by the way I think it’s true of the sport as a whole, certainly at the SL/NRL/International level. The way modern game is in terms of dominating the play the ball and how one team can get a roll on means that a team doesn’t have to be THAT much better in order to rack a couple of tries up.
Personally I’ve thought for a while it’s something we need to look at (though I’m not sure what the answer is) as, especially at international level, it makes it very difficult for smaller nations to compete against the big 3 who often rack up high score lines.

Going back to this game, I thought we were the best team for the first 15/20 mins and were a match for them for the rest of the half. The injuries before the game had an impact, with the likes of Garbutt etc in there we would have had more punch upfront and maybe wouldn’t have played quite as laterally.
The injuries during the game also played a part. Losing Ward would be a blow anyway but even more so with a weakened pack. Losing Walker was massive in my opinion. Looking back at some of the tries Melbourne scored after Walker went off, there were at least 2, possibly 3 tries where a big factor in the try being scored was that we hadn’t numbered up correctly.

So overall I’m not too downheartened. We showed some great stuff with the ball and showed we can trouble the best side in the world.

I think you are missing the point. I think Mullally is pretty much a SL plodder too but he would have made a difference here...Garbutt a significant one gives us 100m plus every game.look at our bench, crikey a championship rookie ormondroyd only prop option and make shift crock Delaney that was it. It was always going to take its toll against the best grinding team on the planet.also meant Cuthbertson had to play battering ram all game which took another dimension away from our play.

BTW, i still don't think we would have won but having Peteru,Garbutt and Mullally in the team think we could have stayed with them longer and made it pretty close.

Completely missing both points here.
A.Garbutt in particular & Mullally offer us more size go forward & rotation against a huge pack.
B.You contradicted yourself offering up Kasiano as some kind of loss for the Storm especially when he hasn't even played for them plus showing no sign of the impact he had 4/5 years ago during his best spells at the Doggies then dismissing our absentees.

Let's look at it this way in regards pecking order

PROPS - Cuthbertson, Singleton, Garbutt, Mullally, Peteru, Galloway, Oledzki, Ormondroyd, Delaney

BACK ROW - Ward, JJB, Ablett, Delaney, Ferres, Ormondroyd, Keinhorst

You honestly think having 8th/9th choice props and a 7th choice back rower (who we didn't get to use in the forwards as he had to fill in at centre) are the exact same as having your top choices.

This assumes that the gains in the Leeds side were not offset by an improved effort from Melbourne. It assumes that Melbourne were playing at their absolute best - something not covered in your scant analysis.

So Delanney was in the 17 for both of the opening games in SL and some on here were suggesting Keinhorst as the starting left centre so suggesting he is a back row forward is spurious and only there to support your argument. Galloway hasn't played for months who is to say he is now an improvement? Peteru has played 20 minutes on what basis is he being judged as a better player than Ormondroyd? Last season Mullally was an average squad player how he has suddenly morfed into James Graham is beyond me.

To suggest Kasiano is less of a miss than either Galloway or Peteru doesn't really stand up to any scrutiny at all.

Leeds were well beaten by a side on a different planet - accept it and move on to a softer competition where Leeds will be there or there abouts come the end of the season.

I have been, and will continue to be, a critic of anything I see which (IMO) does not live up to the expectations we have recently (15 years) become accustomed to.

However, your precis is just knitting fog. If you cannot see that Garbutt (especially) & Mullally, Galloway, Ferris & Oledski wouldn't have made a difference (not to mention the loss of Ward during the game) in how we shared the workload better after a 24 hour flight, going from 0c to 30c (or whatever it was) then I don't know how you judge RL performance. Then, to allege that the absence of Casiano was just as debilitating to Storm, is weird in the extreme.

I haven't seen anyone on here claim that Leeds are the better side, but Storm are NOT 3 times better (the level of multiplication needed for difference in salary cap), nor is that the biggest margin of victory that Storm will enjoy this NRL season - how do those vanquished supporters justify their near-£6M salary outlay?

I think Leeds did remarkably well in the circumstances (& I really enjoyed the game). We will have learned a lot from the game & the younger players will learn a lot from it

Delaney does usually make the 17 when fit but not as your 1st sub prop interchange which he was against Melbourne. Keinhorst surely would've been on the bench to play 2nd row for this game.

You can argue that Kasiano is as much of a Miss as any ONE individual prop for us, but we weren't missing one prop. If just Singleton was missing then you've still have Cuthbertson, Garbutt, Mullally, Peteru/Galloway.

Also people haven't argued that Melbourne weren't the better team, deserved to win and wouldn't still win if we had our strongest 17. We've argued a very weak point that some have jumped on this game to support their preconceived ideas on players whether that be thoughts of Myler & Moon as a partnership or your criticism of Cuthbertson & Parcell who I recall early last season you called respectively a one season wonder and nothing but an average workhorse. See it took all of one defeat in very testing circumstances for it to start this season.

By a very small number of posters and in a very limited way.