I was there too. I missed Smith putting the ball down because I was still watching the winger ((Fletch?) who I was convinced Smithy had offloaded the ball to.

An amazing player and worthy of his own thread.

Casey played mainly at stand off although he arrived as a centre - however you can't put him in the list IMHO because he was not playing SL opposition - and if I recall he sunk without trace at Salford.

Domic - yes.

At his peak, Adam Hughes was a pretty usefull centre. Still remember the try he scored at Headingley and the Wakey match video commentary just repeating the words "Adam Hughes" over and over again getting progressively louder and louder as he beat man after man until eventually crossing the try line.

I take your point on Casey, though I personally rated him highly.
He should have stayed at Wakefield.

I only picked out what I see as "passing" centres. There are a lot of blockbusting runners who are great centres who I wouldn't have picked in this list.

Greatest centres I've seen were in 82 Aussie tour

Steve Rogers was the most skillful centre with a perfect passing game (obviously he could do other things too)
Mal Meninga was the ultimate runner with the ball.

Complete opposites but truely great centres.

Justin Brooker anyone?

Freddie Banquet

Not sure If spelt correctly.

Gene Miles is the best wingers centre I've seen in the last 40 years, he had size, power, decent speed but knew exactly how to create space for his wingman and how to give him the ball so that the space was exploited.

Yep I was there too. If I remember Fulham were unbeaten that season apart from us? Smithy always seemed to have so much time but getting his tie ups was a real bugger!

It was a cup match I believe and once again we were considered to be the under dogs. I agree Smith was a class centre from the dark side but I think the physicality of RL was always a little too much for him.

Around about that time i was watching Trin and Cas in equal amounts, i always thought Smith was anonymous for 90% of games but then could produce that bit of magic. I had completely forgotten about Adam Hughes, whatever happened to him? In the modern day Jamie Lyon was superb for saints but going further back i admired Dick Gemmell at Leeds as a real wingers centre as that was the position i was playing myself at the time. He didn'y score many himself but all his wingers did.

If you had been a bit older and watched Foxy play you would have seen him do that most Saturdays' apart from he didn't waste his energy running across the field, as for a dummy Nelly would sell the winger one, two or three times in the game, John Etty, David Barend's, and Kenny Battye would tell you which centre in RL had the most class.

Neil Fox the best centre for me by a mile. He scored tries himself for fun and made hundreds for others. He had power and guile and in todays game he would have been awesome - as he was then.
Skene and Smith both class centres, but another of my favourites who was only with us a season I think was Geoff Wrigglesworth - never saw him miss with one of his thunderous tackles!

Can't but agree with all this. Neil was so powerful that he would automatically draw at least 2 players creating lots of space. A personal favourite but a totally different kettle of fish was Alan Skene - slight, fast deceptive with a great dive for the try line. He also fed his right wing (Fred Smith if I remember correctly) enough for Fred to be a top try scorer. At that time watching an open game with these backs at their peak was pure pleasure.

Yes, I remember Wriggy, he also had a hand off like a steam hammer. I think he was a farmer and used to practice by wrestling cows at milking time! Good traditional centre.
Another favourite of mine was Jack Marston, down to earth no nonsense centre. Hard as nails Fitzwilliam lad.