This is the point where I have the major dissagreement with what you are saying. Warrington showed on Friday beyond doubt that the bit highlighted is not the case. He was as predictable as wet weather on the coast in November.

Like I said, by reducing the amount of times he ran substantially, IMO he would be more successfull because of it.

And yet, 21 tackles bust, 3 clean breaks and over 7 metres per carry so far this season would suggest that even when defences seemingly know what's coming, it's very difficult to defend against.

Good point. I wonder how many of those came against a pish poor Widnes team.

I think the average stats can be misleading. Against good teams that we will be battling for SIlverware with how well does it work? He did get MOM in the Wire and in the Wigan game was given a good individual report.

My only concern is the detrimental effect on the the structure of the rest of the team

It's futile Andy, Burrow is Gotcha's Peacock

Paul Cullen made a valid point about much pressure was put on the Warrington markers by the fact that Burrow was at acting half. There are times players can get away with a little bit of coasting at acting half, but not against particular players. Burrow's kicking game means not even on the last. I wouldn't be suprised if the scoot threat is also helping draw a few more interference penalties.

The game nowadays is almost "put your best runner at acting half"
Distribution from there doesn't need to be magical, that's needed from the halves and fullback, whilst the hooker just needs to have a long pass to a pivot or a short pass to a runner.
I suspect we'll see more teams also following our defensive structure, and not including the hooker in the middle four unit.

Seeing as you asked. Burrow had his lowest number of carries, metres and D/runs in the SL against Widnes!
(edit: NB: SL this year in case the hair splitter is lurking )

Burrow was 2nd highest metre maker against Manly with 96m and highest number of carries with 16 of those 11 D/runs. Whereas McShane made 11m in 2 carries which were also D/runs.

A little unfair to the player

Sorry. He made 6 tackle busts, 1 clean break, 6 D/runs against Widnes. Including Manly Burrow has made 24 Busts this year.

No obsession with carries but in comparing Burrow with more traditional hookers carries and metres are important. Roby last year topped the charts for metres, carries and d/runs. The hooker is a key creative position together with the 2 half backs and you want these three to have their hands on the ball as much as possible.

You don't mention that Roby also topped the charts for tackles. And Roby, good though he is, was outplayed in the Grand Final and in the 4 Nations by hookers whose main skills were distribution and defensive intensity. Those are still the key parts of a hooker's team game.

I worry about Leeds going this way in the big games. It didn't work last year, where we didn't beat anyone decent until Buderus started playing 80, and against the 3 good teams we've played this year we lost to Wigan, beat Manly with McShane getting good game time and making 20+ tackles, and let in soft tries to Warrington, who didn't score more because of their extraordinary amount of unforced or careless errors.

Burrow's renewed attacking spark from hooker may be enough to compensate for this, but I'm not convinced.

This for me in total agreement.

It might not be liked, but for me had Wire not dropped the ball so much they would have comfortably beaten us on Friday. They had far better attacking structure than we did, and looked far more dangerous. The main attribute to that was the quick clearing and longer passing from the play the ball area.

Give me a class hooker of Buderus ilk any day of the week. And although I have had my doubts about McShane, I think your point about the Manly game is spot on.

To get back to my initial response for Andy Gilder, and thank you JC for confirming the stats. Out of 6 games of achieving 21 tackle busts and 3 clean breaks, which are good stats, 29% of the busts and 33% of the breaks were achieved in just one game against a pish poor side, which coincidentally he didn't play hooker and actually had the least carries in the games so far.

I would argue on that, that my theory of doing what he keeps doing less will result in better success.

Of course Buderus is a huge loss but IMO Burrow is doing a good job (including the WCC) and is doing it in his own way which at the moment is equally successful. I am less concerned regards his tackle count as we have a pack full of tacklers and Burrow can make the tackle on anyone when needed. Who knows Burrow may re-invent the way hookers play in future.

What's a big game?

Was last year's Grand Final a big game? I am sure I saw Burrow jump out of dummy half in that game and create a cracking try for Hall.

Was the WCC against manly a big game?

Was the last league game against Warrington a big game? He was MOM in that, despite Gotcha's insane ramblings.

How much bigger do the games Burrow dominates have to get before you will stop worrying?

Gotcha what Wire team were you watching?
They scored when we fecked up and only made serious yards on the back of penalties.
As pretty as there "long passing game" may have looked we beat them fair and square ,Watkins by plenty v Plug ,Mags ran them ragged and our pack more than handled Morley and co.
Now i know they're a very good team and no doubt will challenge we got a well deserved win and were clearly the better team over the full 80 minutes.
Also their structure with the ball was that good our defence had them panicking and making errors for fun.
Whilst i accept we can and need to improve why do you begrudge giving any sort of credit when we get a well deserved hard fought win?
Also agree G as much as i want to see Mcshane and Hood take the 9 reigns more permanently we've hardly struggled with RB playing their or reverting to his "free-role".