My point is that posters seem to use the negatives from Leeds performance rather than the positives from our performance as the reason we won.

Given that most of our kicks found the floor for once I don't think Hardaker would have made much difference.
Watkins is class so he was a big loss for them but Vea gives us lots of aggressive go forward, and would normally play on Watkins side so not sure Watkins would have had an easy night anyway if they had both played.

Saints played reasonably well with lots of room for improvement, mainly at halfback, so I prefer to think we contained Leeds very well knowing that we still have room for improvement.

Looking at the results in Grand Finals, I'm not so sure either.

2007: Saints were pretty much blown off the park. Not sure if they just switched off that day, or what.
2008: Everyone expected the 'S' to steamroller Leeds, and Anderson definitely lost it at half time as famously seen on the Sky cameras. A good candidate for the mental weakness theory.
2009: Was really close. I don't think Saints bottled it.
2011: Leeds definitely showed superior mental toughness in the last quarter, when Saints failed to kick on from the lead they had built up. Shenton's injury should have been better covered for.

Wouldn't any such issue with Sts players have gone with last year's win?

Besides which, 4 years is a long time in sport - had a quick look at the Leeds 2011 team and 7 players aren't at the club any more. I expect Sts would be similar if not even more changed.

If Leeds meet Sts in the GF I don't think players from either side would make much of the previous GFs TBH, even if the media do.

Let's say it really is possible to have a "mental block" (I'm not ruling it out. All I'm saying is there's no concrete evidence)

Results show they don't last forever. I remember back in the 80s and early 90s when it seemed as though Saints were beaten every time they took the field against Wigan.

I mean, if you're mentally beaten after half-a-dozen major defeats logic suggests you're even more so with each successive defeat. But if that were really true Saints would never have beaten Wigan in the Premiership Final - which was the stepping stone for pretty much all of Saints' SL success.

The truth is that no matter how good the players, no matter how great the advantage - ANY side can experience "one of THOSE" days in a Grand Final where nothing seems to stick, every ricochet drops fortuitously for the opposition, one after another key player falls victim to injury or some idiot gets himself sent off.

Murphy's Law applies equally to Rugby League.

I don't think it's a case of Saints having a mental block at Old Trafford, more a case Leeds having a knack of producing there. We did it again against Warrington in 2012.

That's why ANY opposition team could be wary of facing Leeds at Old Trafford if they get there. Not because they can't produce, but they know Leeds and Sinfield & co. do produce.

At least you can't win from 5th any more!