A 10-year old kid who's new to RL could watch Barba's tries and get excited. He's spectacular, great to watch and scores brilliant tries.

However, it takes a little more knowledge about RL to truly appreciate what Sinfield brings to his side.

Unfortunately, there are alot of "10-year olds" on here.


Also, Barba hasn't been tearing their team apart in SL for the past decade.

No, nothing to do with Tomkins. But your posts reflect someone that has it out for Sinfield regardless of how well he performs or what he achieves .

Some interesting comments on here about the Golden Boot.

I particularly concur with Big Jim Slade's view of Kevin Sinfield's performances during 2012.

One point worth making, when we compare Super League and the NRL, is that there were only two matches between clubs from the two competitions in 2012. Warrington defeated Souths in Sydney and Leeds defeated Manly at Headingley. And don't believe that the Aussie teams don't care about the results in those games.

If the Golden Boot was given to the most exciting player in the world, then I would guess that Ben Barba would have won it, closely followed by Sam Tomkins and Billy Slater.

So what do we mean by the best in the world?

It's hard to be sure. But a player who takes charge of his team on the pitch, inspires them to victory in the biggest games of the season, has a kicking game that creates try after try for a player like Ryan Hall, and is able to kick goals faultlessly, particularly when it counts in crucial matches, surely falls into that category by definition. And he could only be beaten by someone who could demonstrate the same qualities, but even more so.

Every aspect of Sinfield's play in the play-offs was superb. On the other hand, Cameron Smith's poor goalkicking in the play-offs could have cost Melbourne the title. Goalkicking isn't normally a criterion for determining the best player, but when other things are equal it can make the difference, and Sinfield clearly outshone Smith.

Smith and Cronk are a superb combination for Melbourne, Queensland and Australia, and if the Golden Boot were given to two players for their combined work together, I'm sure they would win it by a mile.

It's also worth pointing out, when we compare individual players from Super League and the NRL, that Luke Burgess struggled to get into the Leeds team in 2011, but then went to Oz and was a first choice prop forward for Souths in 2012.

I'm a great admirer of the NRL, but I don't think we should be intimidated by it.

The people who can only appreciate a players class if they are 'flashy' just highlights their poor understanding of the game. Have a choice between someone who masterfully guides his team around the field, great decision maker, passer and goal kicker against a 'maverick' who breaks the line, on balance I'd go for the first everytime.

Sinfield's goalkicking success rate in 2012 was 82.84 per cent,( compared to 69.64 per cent for Smith)...in a team that scores the vast majority of it's tries out wide.
He is by some distance the most composed and consistent kicker the game has ever seen under real pressure.

It's a shame your 'appreciation' of the game is so simplistic that it passes you by.

From what I've seen on here (couldn't be bothered to look through every page...) and on twitter the general consensus is that there is no doubting Sir Kev's ability - he is a fantastic player and a superb leader - but the problem lies with the fact that he has been picked as the 'best in the world' in 2012, which is a bit suspect given who was on the short-list with him. It's a bit like if Wayne Rooney won the Ballon d'Or - nobody would say Rooney is a bad player but they'd question the fact that he'd been THE BEST.

Seeing the Aussie Journalists go into meltdown has been hilarious - calls for an investigation into the voting I seen one of them tweet this morning! It's great to see them have a moan and get so worked up over it!

Did Andy Farrell deserve his award in 2004?

No, no, Smith and Slater make Cronk, you didn't watch every Storm, Origin and Kangaroo match of 2012, I did, I also watched some SL, Sinfield is a good place kicker, but this is Rugby League not rugby union.

King Warrior, Ive met some pricks but you sir are a cactus.

I was massively underwhelmed by Ben Barba in the Grand Final last year, I didn't see anything remotely special from the lad. He's looked good on a 30 minute NRL highlights programme every week but that's all it is.......highlights. I've watched Sinfield play every minute of nearly 40 club games last season,lift 2 trophies and receive 3 medals (2 winners,1 losers), and would say he's been as influential as any player in World Rugby. He fully deserves it and has been justifiably rewarded for his endeavours throughout a long ,hard season.

Probably



Maybe



Nah.

Regardless of subjective individual opinions about the deservedness (is that even a word?) or otherwise of this award, it's great for the English game that a SL player has won it; he may be a moaning, arm-waving, ref-conning lover, but he's also an outstanding RL player who would add value to any SL side and plenty of NRL sides.

Fair play to the bloke and one in the eye for the whining Aussies.

hmmmm,congrats to him but my first reaction was to laugh.

cracking captain. best player in the world over the last 12 months? nobody can convince me of that. Scully won back to back mos and put in some cracking performances against aus.without getting a sniff of the golden boot

Unfortunately for Sculthorpe in those two years there was Andrew Johns and Stacey Jones. In 2001 Johns won the NRL GF, The Clive Churchill Medal, and an Ashes series, whilst Jones took an NZ side to the GF for the first time along with the drawn series in GB. It was also the year of GB's embarrassment in Sydney