Ok

but its still relevant imo

it was bennett but that quote also applies to mac without a doubt

Credit to you for that. Just looked at the opening post on that thread, and even Lowes is doing OK for himself now!

I'll admit to not having been a McDermott fan, and not because he used to play for Bradford. When he came, I thought he was a good choice and it was a flip up between him and Powell. But I did think he'd play exciting rugby. We never seemed to get that, but the events of the last few weeks have seen me warm to him. The loses to Bradford and London weren't his fault. He picked teams capable of winning but the players didn't do it. Yeah, some blame laid with him. But he used the squad, like many of us have called for, against the 2 weakest teams in the league.



Then, ready some of the articles in the build up to the game I understood him a bit more and understood why the players love him. He knows how special this group is and what winning the CC meant to them. As fans we like to think losing means everything to us but really its nothing. To the players and staff it means everything and he's given them the game plan to win the last 2 cup games. So well done Brian and I was one of those saving the biggest cheer for when he lifted the cup. My only beef was when they were having the team picture after and he hovered at the edge. They should have made him stand in the middle but I guess that's just him.



Also want to say thank you to Gary Hetherington. He gets stick for not spending money on big signings but he's got us to this level and helped maintain it whilst making a profit. Sure he's done a lot in the background to create our culture and players wanting to play for the club for less money.

These knock-out games are all about winning and that's what this team did in this competition in 2014. The game-plan was depressingly dour at times (entire sets seemingly played in a ten metre short side channel, kicks in attacking field position negatively drilled into touch) but irrelevant in the circumstances.



I'm pleased for but most of all relieved for the core group of players and congratulate them for completing their domestic set of honors - anything that fell short of that would have been a travesty.

damned with faint praise indeed.



for one so concerned with stats and seemingly with success rates you seemed to have somehow overlooked something in your post...care to fill us in on the match yesterday ????

Castleford 10 Leeds 23



Not sure whether it was Wayne Bennett or Brian McDermott who said it but hard to disagree with either.

The faintest of praise indeed by one of the usual suspects.





Bet he hated the cheer for McDermott lifting the cup (which was one of the best moments of the day IMO)

I still don't agree with his 3 man substitutes, but he got it spot on in the final for me. After a dominant first half for us, Cas were always going to come out with a win at all costs response. The "negative" tactics were spot on for me and were pretty much the same we used to nullify Vainikolo several years ago.



When he was nearly in tears during the BBC interview it really showed how much it meant to him and that's all you can ask for from a coach. Long may his reign and sometimes baffling uses of substitutes continue

The game plan was similar in that we had a clear kicking plan and executed it very well but they were totally different kicking plans.



Yesterday was all centred around Clark. If you are trying to stop him you have already failed. What Leeds did was stop Clark by stopping cas ever getting a roll on. By kicking out each set we got a breather, a set defence and 90m from our try line. We then used the extra energy we had from the scrum, to put in some aggressive defrnce and starve Clarke of any chance to go from dummy half with any real affect.

Yep. And it didn't allow Dorn or Carney to counter attack when returning kicks.

There's way too much bitterness on these boards ATM. We should all revel in the success, and perhaps agree to leave the past behind?



I was a BM doubter early on. What he clearly has is the support of the spine of the team - Sinfield, Peacock et al - which is where, seemingly his predecessor fell down after a good start. Coming in to manage players with their records couldn't have been easy, and I for one take my hat off to him.



His biggest challenge lies ahead though - managing the gradual (even potentially not-so-gradual) replacement of the core players over the next few years.