Quote McClennan="McClennan"Give over man. No doubt you are playing exceptionally well at the moment and the work that your pack is doing is terrific, however I'd take the Saints pack of '06 over your current lot who are playing above themselves.'"
Playing above themselves - I see what you did there. Amusing.
The problem your 2006 side has in terms of claims to greatness is that it faced little or no real opposition. That season was a real low point for SL. Your win was overshadowed to a degree by the interest in Wigan's battle against relegation, such was the lack of interest in the competition. I stand to be corrected but I don't think even your own fans turned out in large numbers to watch you that season.
The fact is that you topped the table by 8 points from Hull. Leeds, Wigan and Bradford were not great (we were awful, obviously) and the Wolfs were poor. Catalans were still in the initial building phase.
Compare that with 2012. If we are to win the SL we will have to get past Wire almost certainly. While I think we have the edge on them they have some exceptional players and are a very, very good side indeed. We may have beaten Catalans today but they are a strong side with a massive pack and some real quality in the backs too. Huddersfield are a very good outfit too, and they did a real number on us at the start of the season. Saints too are a good side, albeit I think if Brown were at TP already you would be a bigger threat than you are.
The environment was very different in 2006. Leaving aside the question of how good the Saints team of that era was I think we can safely say there are at least 4 teams in SL better than the second best team in 2006. 2006 was a bit like the centenary championship season in 1995 when Wigan won easily, but it seemed the other teams weren't even competing.
Bradford in 2003 had a monster pack. I still can't believe their winning margin in the GF was as low as it was because we were totally outmuscled and outclassed in the forwards in that game, despite having players like Craig Smith, Farrell, O'Connor and Newton in the pack. We are getting close to that level of power now, blowing teams away in the first 20, but for me that Bulls back of 2003 remains the benchmark.