Should be a great occasion, almost sold out ground fairly strong looking Leeds side, I expect a NZ win but should be a good test for young/fringe players. It clearly shows there is an appetite for full all be it short tours. Full kangaroo tour against GB with 3-4 club games would be great.

Agreed, I'm really pumped for this series. You're quite right, tours are short these days, gone are the days of 7-8 game tours I think but if this one does well you never know. Personally I think NZ should have played France as well, in avignon or something, they always sell out that ground, just to give the tour a bit more variety and wider interest.

In terms of Australia we will have to wait until 2019 to see about them touring I guess, that's the nest year that is free with four nations in 2016 and 18 and world cup in 2017.

I'll be there, I'll enjoy it, but can't see anything other than a big NZ win. 54-12.

How many SL club sides could attract a 20,000 crowd to nothing more than an end of season friendly and probably rake in close to £500,000 into the coffers before deductions to the Kiwis etc. are taken out?


The Rhinos will get absolutely murdered against the Kiwi's,Even if it had been played mid season then i still reckon that we would have done well to keep the loss below 20 points

Our lads have been on the lash big time since the GF win and who can blame them?

I'm still going to pay my respects to our departing players and also to say goodbye to our returning heroes Mozza and Ali

It was a wise decision to include the hardened Schnapps drinking German Joachim "James" Keinhorst in the centres.

Nevertheless I am expecting a 58-10 win for the Kiwis.


Their mascot "Poppa C" (aka "Gutterfax"icon_wink.gif will be excited.

Unfortunately Leeds have a lot of injuries. McDermott himself said that if the season had gone on 1 game longer he'd have been struggling to find 17 fit players.

Peacock said a long time ago he wouldn't be playing in it. Understandably Yorkshire don't want Sinfield playing (hand injury my backside).

Obviously Hardaker, Watkins and Hall are unavailable. That's 5 players out. Then add in the injuries to Burrow, Ablett, Delaney (all played with injuries in the Grand Final), Jones-Buchanan, Ward, Aiton & Sutcliffe and you've got a total of 12 players out.

Considering there's 12 top players out then the team Leeds have named isn't that bad.

If Leeds keep NZ to 2-3 scores difference they'll have done very well.

Considering also that the likes of Cuthbertson, McGuire and Briscoe can't have been far off England selection then it could've been even more depleted.

I don't think I've seen one Leeds fan predict a victory. We all know it's going to be a Kiwi win. A respectable score line would be nice but it'll still be an enjoyable occasion whatever. Who knows when the next time Leeds or any other SL club will get this chance? We have been very fortunate though that it's landed at the end of such an amazing year for us and the fans are over the moon right now with the club and the 3 guys are retiring and Morley and Ali can join in too. 12 months ago after the disappointing early playoff exit and no retirees then the gate would've been much smaller I reckon.

But they won't. 10 tries to 2 is the more likely outcome.

Funnily enough it will be when England beat France this weekend too.

The Kiwi forwards have the potential to smash Leeds to bits, particularly with it being effectively an exhibition game and nothing to gain from putting bodies on the line. If I were Kearney I'd much prefer to work on planned moves and organisation (especially general kicking) than simply watch forwards crashing over. If they do just focus on their strengths that will help England a lot.

FYI Leeds have only ever beaten NZ once, with the last two tour games being fairly heavy defeats.

The only thing about the debacle of a union game worth remembering was how Wigan scored 2 x 100m+ tries in the one game. I would bet the house that hasn't since occurred at Twickenham in union at any decent level in the 20 years since.

Garcia is the best, Jean. All of my posts are positive about rugby league. How does that even relate to a union troll identified by Durham early on?

Regarding the match itself my views are:-

1. As a long time Leeds supporter, I would love to see Leeds win.
2. The result for me though isn't that important. The best thing is to see something of old tours reinstated with games between national sides and strong clubs. Rugby league is missing the quality of occasions like say Wigan v Australia from 1986 or 1990 as two quick examples. Leeds v Australia prior to Wembley 1990 also springs to mind with the result really opening up (educated) Australian eyes about what could happen in the First Test. This was great theatre and publicity for the game prior to a major Test match. Australia has lost this too with games like these disappearing without Tours. Lions tour and Kangaroo tour each 4 years should be immediately inserted into the schedule at international level.

I can see it being fairly brutal, especially early on. It will be interesting to see whether the ref will want to be remembered as the one who sent off 3 Leeds legends in their farewell match and a handful of Kiwi test forwards.