I couldnt agree more.

Scrap the Magic Weekend and the playoff series then, will give a longer off-season for elite players.

As long as you have an unbalanced fixture list however, first past the post is not an acceptable way of deciding the champions IMO.

This is a bit of a myth really. And an all too easy excuse for people (including Warrington fans) to use to explain it. The fact is, Leeds won with a closing minutes penalty kick, if Myler had been onside when he charged down the drop goal attempt, it could well have been that Warrington drove up field for Briers to kick a winning drop goal.

My summary of the situation was: Leeds won, fair and square, perhaps the best game of Rugby League I watched all last season and one which literally could have swung either way at the death. Superb entertainment which is what the playoffs is allegedly all about.

An unbalanced fixture list is the only valid justification for having a playoffs in the first place IMO. (Aside from the fact that it's also an exciting climax to the year, which can't be argued against, the quality of the games, specifically the semi-finals and the final itself, tend to be amazing).

One thing the traditionalists (we always had playoffs prior to '74 so what's your problem, etc) always fail to mention (deliberately or not I can never work out), is that the original playoffs system used in RL was done so precisely because it was so [idifficult[/i to have an even fixture list, especially in the early 1900s, where the players all had full time jobs and travelling across the country was logisitically much more difficult, time consuming and expensive than it is now.

At a certain point, tradition takes over with these things (we've always done it this way, why change it) - but the reasons as to why something is done the way it is get lost and regarded as irrelevant, but IMO it's just as relevant as the tradition itself. If in the early days of the Northern Union travel across the country for all teams was no big problem, and had it been easy to run a balanced league fixture list, I think it likely that playoffs would never have featured in RL in this country until introduced in 1998.

Agreed, Leeds played exactly the same teams that Warrington did in the regular season, only they lost more often. Or maybe that was part of Leeds (unsporting) plan all along - to make sure they played tighter games by purposely being crap?

All this discussion does do one thing, it diminishes Leeds (or IMO Rob Burrows, let's face it, without him Leeds wouldn't have got past round 1) amazing feat of winning the Grand Final from 5th

On the contrary, I think Leeds performed amazingly in the last month of the regular rounds and in the playoffs, teams will be hard pushed to ever emulate that.

What does diminish Leeds' achievement though is to say that they only beat Warrington because of Warrington's inexperience in those kind of games. Implying that somehow Leeds had no right to win it.

I have no problem with the playoffs. Except the club call thing.

I don't see that. The ability to win big games is what makes the eventual last club standing worthy champions.

It used to be a truth in Oz, back when it was NSWRL and top 5! , that for a team that is new to those big games that they had to lose a few to learn how to win them. Same deal.

No, because Leeds have plenty of experience of those games and Warrington are relatively new at it. When Leeds were losing those big games it's when that group of players were new together and new at that level. It took them several years of losing out and making dumb decisions in big moments to become the team they became.

I'm not saying necessarily that Warrington lost last year because they couldn't hack the pressure - good teams can lose games too. But teams in general do need to learn how to win pressure games.

What I am saying though is that it's not an insult to Leeds to say that Warrington have less experience of that kind of situation. The cup is different, even the final. Your entire season isn't on the line in the cup.

They do - but I don't buy that that's the reason why Warrington last that specific game last season, not when it was decided by a single penalty. The year before however, with the implosion of blowing away an early lead vs. Saints and the subsequent non-performance against a very good Huddersfield side, I would absolutely agree was down to a lack of experience.



That depends entirely on your league position surely? If you're out of the playoffs and not looking likely to make an impression in them even if you make it, but somehow get in to a cup final - I'd say your season is entirely on the line

Go back to the league meaning something then the premiership at the end as a seperate comp

I don't think it's as simple as that though. It doesn't really matter what the deciding factor is in any given game. You made a good point recently in another thread. I can't remember what the incident was but there was a contentious decision that someone was claiming had cost their team the game. They argued that if the ref had got that right they could have won. You said, correctly in my view, that if the ref had got it right then the restart would be different and the whole rest of the game would have taken a different path. It was a decision point in the game.

I don't see why this is different.

Again, I'm not saying Warrington lost that game last year because they weren't mentally tough enough. I'm saying the margin is no guide to that.

The truth is none of us know outside Warrington's mental state. The pressure's higher to deliver this year though so I hope for your sakes it's good enough.



I'd assumed that was a given. If you're out of the play offs your season is over, not on the line. Barring something special it's over if you're outside the top two or three.

Leeds are (reluctantly) a special mob who have previously won the title several times. They are the only ones who could have won it from 5th.

Wigan gave it a good bash from outside the top 4 on a three occasions, only winning it when finishing top.

Saints have failed to win it from first, second and third, so I doubt if they can do it from outside the 4.