still wrong that SL sides don't all have reserve sides yet can come along and sign lads from championship clubs that do run a reserve side.

Absolutely.

Frustrating as it is we have all done it at some time, SL poach off us, we poach off other Championship clubs, Champ and below.

The hope is not all the better players will be picked off and the investment will pay off overall.

From a wider perspective I wonder how many goods lads are lost to the game completely or never realise their full potential with many teams having no structured pathway.

With the funding available outside SL and crowd levels it's amazing how some teams can get 13 on the pitch and 4 on the bench.

Talking to one of the Hull trainers the other week, they do run 2 teams apart from the 1st team.

To make it at the top level of any sport alongside the talent that will take you there you have to have personal drive and commitment, as well as an element of luck.

I applaud the fact he has taken his chance and only sad that Fax will never be in a position to offer someone the opportunity to achieve a goal of playing regularly at the top level.

He may not achieve that goal, but as there are roughly 300 professionals in Super League of which a third are overseas or French, that means, with say a ten year career, roughly each year only say 20 to 25 UK guys break through. It's bloody tough, and is harder when clubs in SL don't run Reserve Grade.

Where's France then....Leicestershire?

Nice attempt at a joke....but.....


To be pedantic French players are not "overseas" under RFL rules which is why I was specific their rules state

" An “overseas Player” is one who cannot produce satisfactory evidence to the RFL that he is a Professional Player in accordance with the EU Rules guaranteeing the free movement of workers. "

Could all change in the future now

A frog is a frog is a frog! The Rupert Brooke, Rugby. Purity Gold, 3.8% Mmm!

The RL "family" can feel like one big clique.
I have seen Jason Robinson style players lost to work in a rubbish working class job instead. Some clubs see talent and don't nurture it and prefer their friends and family to be given the opportunity.