Yeah, most definitely. The pack lays the platform

Leeds were missing two forwards Garbutt and Mullally even if Galloway was fit it is unlikely he would play ahead of Cuthbertson, Darbutt, Singleton and Mullally and Ferres would never get in ahead of Ward, JJB and Ablett. If Melbourne had played Kasiano and Kaufusi they would added as much as Garbutt and Mullally. The idea that Mullally/Ferres etc. would have had a big influence on the game is grasping at straws IMO. Yes Leeds lost Walker but Melbourne also lost Slater and even at this stage of his career Slater is still in a different world to Walker as a player.

Leeds will not be far off winning the GF this year but the gulf in class between the 2 competitions should not be ignored.

Kasiano? The 3 good games a season lummox? He's another Mase Masoe looks like tarzen plays like jane & i've been watching him for years.
Absolutely Garbutt & Mullally would make a difference maybe not to the result but our efforts 100%.

"Maybe not the result"



Of course having two mediocre props in Garbutt and Mullally on wouldn't have turned around a 7 tries to 1 victory against a far more talented, and drilled outfit in Melbourne.

You're more delusional than Mcdermott who in his post game interview said gives his players 8-10 games and they would be at Melbourne level.

The difference between the competitions is night and day, its like the gulf between super league teams, and championship.

Kasiano at the Storm will be a different player - if he isn't he wont be there long.

The idea that two very average players would have made such a massive difference against the best club side in the world defies any kind of logic. It also suggets that the only side that could have improved its performance was Leeds - again grasping at straws is duly noted

Galloway probably wouldn't get in if Garbutt and Mullally were fit, but he and Peteru would both be ahead in the pecking order of what we ended up having on the bench

These players missing probably wouldn't have a big influence in terms of anything special ball in hand but it's about sharing the workload in the forwards and working as a unit. The likes of Cuthbertson could've done more had he had some bigger and better teammates in the prop position. Not every player in a 17 is there to do something special, some are there to do a role that allows others to be match winners.

By the time Melbourne lost Slater at HT the damage had already been done.

And I don't see anybody saying that Leeds would have won, or denying the size of the gap between NRL and SL, but to say Leeds missing players wouldn't have made any difference is ridiculous and sensationalist.

Printer put it very well - there were some of our better players absolutely gassed from having to do the majority of the graft. Cuthbo, Watkins, Hall, Briscoe, Singo, JJB, Sutcliffe appeared to do a ton of donkey work. With some more able back up forwards, this wouldn't have been so much of a necessity. Melbourne would still have won, comfortably, but we'd have been in the contest for longer. Our 20 mins good spell at the beginning of the game showed we could hang with them, but we tired, and they were efficient, effective and ruthless, as Melbourne always are. They'll beat a number of NRL sides more convincingly throughout the season, that I guarantee. Doesn't alter the fact that NRL is lightyears ahead of SL, but the lads did themselves proud. And put them in the NRL, with the benefit of getting used to being happy required to play high intensity and quality week on week and they'd hold their own - they'd get spanked some weeks, but they'd compete most weeks. There's probably only 3 or 4 teams in SL at best that could do that - the majority would Ben slaughtered week in, week out.

A very good summary of the game Superted

It's very difficult to be critical of Leeds in my opinion. A depleted team, under some unfamiliar rules, against a team that are way better than most NRL teams - let alone SL teams. Yet we made sure they knew they had been in a game. McDermott is right - given a similar salary cap & playing a similar number of games per season as an NRL team - SL teams would easily compete.

What a truly memorable experience, could do without 21 hours in the air to get home though!

Congrats on completely missing the point & not understanding how having 2 extra first choice props would have improved our efforts not only in performance but sharing the workload.

Grasping at straws really?
Just stating the obvious in terms of how they'd have added more to us it's not hard to see or understabd that.
Also your happy to dismiss those 2 as average yet make out the serial plodder would have had an impact for them.

I was relatively pleased with the performance. Some people are looking too much at the score line which shows a bigger gap between the teams than is the reality in my opinion.

I don’t just think that about this game by the way I think it’s true of the sport as a whole, certainly at the SL/NRL/International level. The way modern game is in terms of dominating the play the ball and how one team can get a roll on means that a team doesn’t have to be THAT much better in order to rack a couple of tries up.
Personally I’ve thought for a while it’s something we need to look at (though I’m not sure what the answer is) as, especially at international level, it makes it very difficult for smaller nations to compete against the big 3 who often rack up high score lines.

Going back to this game, I thought we were the best team for the first 15/20 mins and were a match for them for the rest of the half. The injuries before the game had an impact, with the likes of Garbutt etc in there we would have had more punch upfront and maybe wouldn’t have played quite as laterally.
The injuries during the game also played a part. Losing Ward would be a blow anyway but even more so with a weakened pack. Losing Walker was massive in my opinion. Looking back at some of the tries Melbourne scored after Walker went off, there were at least 2, possibly 3 tries where a big factor in the try being scored was that we hadn’t numbered up correctly.

So overall I’m not too downheartened. We showed some great stuff with the ball and showed we can trouble the best side in the world.