HalifaxCoach: Matt Calland
League position: third
Dangerman: Sean Penkywicz
Why they will win it: Phenomenal points scoring potential
SPORT can be cruel, can't it?
Halifax, sitting top two most of the year, found themselves pipped at the post by Celtic for that all important second place, leaving them to go the long way round if they want to fulfil their Grand Final dream.
For the league's best part time team that should prove fatal, with Matt Calland's side now facing a minimum three match route to the decider rather than the one or two they had originally hoped for.
In truth though, if Fax can steer clear of the kind of serious injuries that have dogged their progress this year, it could end up doing them a favour.
The truth is that Fax are not playing well enough at the moment to make a final, let alone win it.
Their ball control and defence, their Achilles heels for most of the year, are more troublesome than ever and their free-flowing attack, breathtaking at times in 2008, has been stuttering in recent weeks.
So while they will need to go the long way round, starting with Widnes tomorrow night, Fax at least have a chance of playing themselves into some kind of form.
The key, as it has been all year, will be finally finding some consistency: both week to week and minute to minute.
If they can do that, and perhaps get long term casualties like Dana Wilson, David Larder and Mick Govin back on board at some stage, they remain a dangerous proposition for any side.
SalfordCoach: Shaun McRae
League position: winners
Dangerman: Jon Wilshere
Why they will win it: The best front row combination in the competition and Craig Stapleton and Phillip Leuluai
SHAUN McRae's side have been at the top of the pile all year without every really managing to replicate the dominance Hull KR and Castleford exerted over the course of the last two National League One seasons.
The Reds have done everything McRae and his paymaster, chairman John Wilkinson, would have wanted at the start of the season.
They have topped the league ladder and won the Northern Rail Cup, while securing the most important victory of all off the field in the shape of a precious Super League licence.
But they've also lost pretty convincingly at places like Whitehaven and Widnes, drawn at Sheffield and were in a whole heap of trouble against Halifax at the Willows before Karl Fitzpatrick's miracle off load got them home to put them in the box seat for that first placed finish.
So while Salford will start the play off series as favourites - and have every advantage in terms of their draw - they aren't the shoo ins for the big win that Rovers and the Tigers were.
Their strengths lie up front, where Phil Leuluai and Craig Stapleton are arguably the two best props in the division, and in the experience of captain Malcolm Alker and pensionable Kiwi Robbie Paul.
Their weaknesses lie behind the scrum, where half backs Richie Myler and Stefan Ratchford marry prodigious talent with the callow inexperience of youth and could just as easily lose them a Grand Final as win it.
Salford have been singularly fortunate with injuries in 2008, but some ill-timed casualties now could derail them at the worst possible moment.
Celtic CrusadersCoach: John Dixon
League position: second
Dangerman: Jace Van Dijk
Why they will win it: Great recent form and a boat load of high quality Australian imports who know how to win the games that matter
AH, new South Wales.
Newly promoted 12 months ago as National League Two champions, John Dixon's expensively assembled Australian army now stand on the verge of their second successive triumph.
Celtic made a predictably steady start to life in NL1, but have got better and better as the year has gone by and clinched second place in the table on the final weekend by beating Salford in Bridgend.
So while you can justifiably point the finger over the merits of their successful Super League application - a paltry official crowd of 1,400 attended their crucial first v second date with the Reds - their on field quality is indisputable.
They may have lost out to Salford on two out of three occasions - once in the league and once in a Northern Rail Cup semi final - but they were preciously close to victory in greater Manchester and also won the match that really mattered a couple of weeks ago.
That gives them the momentum that is so crucial in any play off series, more so than Salford.
Celtic also have the strength up front - think Jordan James, Neil Budworth, David Tangata Toa - and the defensive structure, to cope with the Reds' attack.
And the return of dominant half back Jace Van Dijk, absent since May with a broken jaw but a stunning influence on his return against Halifax three weeks ago, has given them a creative edge they have lacked for most of the year.
That makes them an incredibly dangerous proposition for anyone, and Salford should be far from certain of winning the one v two clash at Salford next week.
Potential champions? Without a doubt.
LeighCoach: Neil Kelly
League position: fourth
Dangerman: Dennis Moran
Why they will win it: Coach Kelly has been there and done it, winning previous titles with Dewsbury and Widnes
IF we're being honest, not many pundits would pick Leigh out as genuine contenders for a Grand Final win.
True, the Hilton Park outfit have earned their league status with some solid displays.
But they look short of both the quality and the control needed to win the competition.
They have some of the ingredients - a clever half back in Ian Watson, the unpredictable brilliance of Dennis Moran, two solid hookers in Dave McConnell and Aaron Smith - but lack some others: genuine quality in the outside backs and front row and, most importantly, the collective discipline and structures needed against the top sides.
They have certainly improved since former lower league golden boy Neil Kelly, the coach who steered both Dewsbury and Widnes to Grand Final wins in the old Northern Ford Premiership, replaced Darren Shaw.
But with an approach based on overt physicality - a disciplinary tightrope they have fallen off at times in recent weeks - and enthusiasm rather than class, the impression lingers that they will be tripped up sooner rather than later.
Their rematch with Whitehaven at the weekend, just a fortnight after a bloodbath at Hilton Park that saw three men sent off and guaranteed a build up laced with genuine antipathy, is winnable.
From that point on, any further rewards will be a classic case of over achievement.
WhitehavenCoach: Ged Stokes
League position: fifth
Dangerman: Greg McNally
Why they will win it: Haven's recent win at Celtic proved that they might, just might, be finally learning to replicate their Recreation Ground form on the road
A FEW short months ago, Ged Stokes' appointment as successor to the unfortunate Paul Crarey was being roundly denounced by the club's supporters.
The affable Kiwi's crime? He used to be in charge just up the coast at Workington, of course.
Since then, Stokes has undergone an image transformation akin to Graham Holroyd's at Halifax in 2007: villain to season-saving hero in the space of a few short weeks.
Stokes has brought confidence back to the Recreation Ground, master-minding a string of home wins against all the comp-etition's big guns, a surge in form that yielded a final league position that looked more or less impossible earlier in the year.
The club have also finally unleashed teenage half back Greg McNally, a youthful talisman who is, if rumours are to be believed, on his way to Leeds in 2009.
McNally has certainly given Haven an X factor to go with their juggernaut pack, and much will depend on how successfully he deals with the extra attention that is about to come thundering downfield in his direction.
Haven's problems remain the same as they have done for the last few years though: questionable away form and major doubts over their ability to find that extra 10 per cent that separates the pretenders from the contenders.
They will certainly be no pushovers, and any side who takes them lightly will likely end up on their collective backsides, but winners? I just can't see it.
WidnesCoach: Steve McCormack
League position: sixth
Dangerman: Bob Beswick
Why they will win: it A big budget, full time squad with big game quality in Beswick, Mark and Matty Smith and Steve Tyrer
WIDNES are the wildcard.
Steve McCormack's side were docked nine points for last season's financial cave-in before a ball was kicked, a deficit that only saw them scrape into the six in the last few weeks of the regular season.
Now they're in though, they could prove to be very, very dangerous.
Let's do the maths. Give the Vikings back the points they lost and they would have finished third in the table, pushing everyone else down a place. They have also taken five points from a possible six against Salford this season, as well as drawing at Halifax.
In short, tomorrow's night's Shay showdown is not your usual third against sixth date.
The Vikings have the advantage of being full time, and they are stacked with quality players in key positions, with Bob Beswick at loose forward, Mark Smith at hooker and on loan St Helens' pair Steve Tyrer and Matty Smti standing comparison with any individuals in the competition.
The key is whether McCormack, backed by transport tycoon Steve O'Connor's millions, can weld the parts together into a coherent team, and lately there have been signs that, after a rollercoaster year, he is finally getting there.
Basically, Widnes could be good enough to go all the way. And the nearer they got to the Grand Final, the more dangerous they would become.
The full article contains 1730 words and appears in n/a newspaper.
