Quote ="sally cinnamon"In the old days when Saints dominated and won the Challenge Cup and/or the minor premiership and SL, the Man of Steel used to go to whoever had the best season at Saints...Long, Scully, Lyon, Wellens, Roby, Graham. In those days there were always people saying it shouldn't just go to someone from a top team by default, they should look at players at other clubs who have made a big difference to their team having a good season, like Jason Smith or Denis Moran in his London Broncos Days, or Gareth Ellis when Wakefield made the playoffs for the first time. Then when Hodgson gets it people asked what Huddersfield had won....
The idea of Man of Steel these days is is its an award voted for by the players for who they regarded as the player of the season so it reflects who has won the respect of their peers on the field. Hodgson got it because Huddersfield who had previously been a middling team, suddenly became a top 3 side and made a major final, Hodgson made a huge difference to them on the field.'"
Adrian Vowles won it when at Cas the first year of the play-off system. I remember Shane McNally winning Coach of the Year at Wakey & I think Kelly did for Widnes also. Generally the awards go to the right people & while I disagree that Richards was a man of steel this year, I can't argue with him winning the equivalent of player of the year. Nor can I argue with Maguire or Tomkins or indeed Wigan and their awards.
What is fantastic is that there were so many people who could have won those awards - at Wire, Smith, Morley, Monas, Westwood, Harrison all talked about justifiably as potential award winners; at Saints, Graham, Cunningham, Foster again all in with shouts; Nobby at Crusaders; Cudjoe at Giants; Peacock, McGuire, Clarkson at Leeds all among many others. It is fantastic for RL that there are so many players all performing on a weekly basis at a level where they are genuine contenders at the end of season awards ceremony...
