Good, solid organising 7. Exactly what we need at the moment.

Less talented than Wheeler/Eastmond/Lomax though, so was let go.

Wish Wheeler/Eastmond/Lomax were half as robust as him though!

playing for free for the love of the club.

Confirmed

[urlhttp://www.saintsrlfc.com/news/2810[/url

Fair assessment of him. And I suppose that every player moved out of position to accomodate the injured halves is only going to create new problems. Good move Saints!



All the best for Friday.

I want us to keep hold of Matty, thought he was very underrated here after his heroics getting us to the 2007 GF, would have been a better option than Scott Moore IMO.
I hope he tears it up, and the saints board are left embarrased by the decision.

Would it be Leon or Eastmond you would have had him in front of? If you think we'd play him hooker - he's no Roby and we resigned Moore in the year he made the Dream Team at hooker.

Even if he wins every MOM between now and the GF, there's no reason for the board to be embarrassed about the decision not to re-sign him. He's 23 years old - he doesn't want to be sat around waiting for injuries to better players, nor could our salary cap allow him to do that with Lomax/Wheeler who can play in the halves.

Others have summed it up, he's not in the same league and doesn't have that bit of magic that Kyle does, but he's a more than competent squad member and a great option for Saints to have.

He'll do a solid job for Saints and in particular our kicking game should improve with him in the team.

In the days of pay as you play contracts, the likes of Wheeler and Eastmond would have had a pain killing injection and go out onto the field. I seriously think that some of these young pro's expect to be 100% fit and healthy for every game when in reality, someone like Longy and Kieron spent their entire career carrying one injury or another.

My honest opinion is he may have been a victim of bad timing. Kyle is better, but i doubt we'll keep him longterm and i think Matty would make a better 9 or 7 than Scott. Matty's distribution is much better, but as you say when we resigned Scott he was in the dream team.

You'd think it was Lockyer you'd had the thumbs up to play Friday

John Wilkin in the halves makes Matty Smith look like Lockyer.

i was at the willows this year....... and i beg to differ. plus, eastmond and smith as a combo would have worked quite well IMO. however, the salary cap dictates that you can't have all the best players so you have to pick who to keep and who to let go.

still, i would have liked us to have kept him over scott moore.

Actually made me chuckle



Anyway, Smith played very well in the SKY game against your lot this season, maybe he will be the spark for you this friday.

But your fans were saying he was brilliant after he had 1 or 2 decent performances there. His brain isn't fast enough to be a half back IMO.

Fact!

Smith isnt in the 19man squad after all that.

Love it ! I await "He's not that good any way..."

I'd go:

Wello
Foster
Gidley
Meli
Gardner
Lomax
Moore
Graham
Cunningham
Hargreaves
Wilkin
Flannery
Roby

Soliola
Puletua
Fa'asavalu
Clough

If Lomax is unfit, Smith will play.

Correctermundo sir

I'd swap Fa'asavalau for Emmitt, having two players on the bench that aren't match fit is a bit of a risk IMO.

Agree it's a risk, but it's not sudden death and they both need minutes if we're to win the GF.

I'm over the moon!!

Hopefully he proves everybody (but me!) wrong, leads us to a Grand Final victory and walks away leaving us red faced at letting him go.

Excellent news.

I'm not sure we do need Fa'asavalau, though obviously he'd be a benefit. After this match it is sudden death, would part of one match be enough for him to gain match fitness?

I'm looking at it as we could have Maurie with 2/3 games under his belt by the GF (touch wood), and Soliola with 3/4.

From memory, Maurie has played some very good rugby 2 or 3 games after returning from injury - fresh and free of niggles - he'd be a big plus for us if we can get him up to speed quickly enough.

I agree it's a pretty tough judgement call though, but I'd be tempted to go with it and assume that Maurie with a couple of games would offer more than Emmitt can.