I'd say within 14 points of the champions by a side missing both its key playmakers and its biggest forward isn't a bad effort.

You mean Webb, Lauititi and Peacock?

Which of those 2 are key playmakers then?

This whole where Bradford are at the moment really doesn’t count. For example Hull FC have looked like Grand Final winning material at the start of the last two seasons including this one.

The big three in this country at the moment (in SL) and have been for a long time are Wigan, Leeds and St Helens. Teams that the rest struggle against come play off time.

Anyone can get in the top 8. Didn’t Hull KR do just that last year?

i think rather than go round in circles watching the fairly depressing sight of people being convincingly owned by Damo we should just understand the difference between the numbers 2 and 3

Then we can move onto the fact Leeds were without both Webb and Burrow who are clearly two key playmakers, aswell as two of their top 3 forwards

Leeds top 3 forwards : Peacock, Eastwood, Sinfield


I make that 1.


Stretch it to 5 and add Leuluai & Ablett. Still 1.

That's all down to opinion that one mate.

From what you hear on SS Ablett is more valuable to them than Lautiiti.

If Smith can't get them up to scratch what chance does Steve "McClaren" McNamara have. Brought in because he met the crieria, English and cheap.

Or because he's good at bringing through and training young english players?

Or because he has the eye to tweak a player's techniques and perhaps their position to get the best out of them (Michael Platt from a liabilty at full-back to a strong running centre)

Don't get me wrong, i'm not claiming him to be a tactical genius or a motivational one, but he has a good record of training youngsters and mentoring them well.

You can’t hear from Southstander because it’s a message board. But you can read from southstander

Peacock is arguably Leeds best prop. Lautiiti can change a game as he has done many a time. Webb is the same likewise.

However thanks to Leeds having strength in depth it can make them three players look average. I don’t hear as many ‘Ryan Bailey is crap’ calls on this thread like you normally do. But now he’s a champion all of the sudden.

You can't hear those, you can only read them.

OK, so where we are now in your reasoning is this

1. Steve McNamara is a bad coach because he can't coach Bradford to any success

2. Bradford are in fact a mediocre side

3. When somebody points out that McNamara has coached this mediocre side to 4th in the table at the half way stage in the SL season, that doesn't count

Is that about right?

In which case, could I ask which criteria apart from the results he achieves should we measure a coach on?

Ta