Outstanding academy status

Having spent some time studying the coaching of junior rugby league (I am a sports coach specifically working with junior/youth development), specifically scholarship level rugby I see Leeds as a "producer" rather than a "developer" of young players.

In the past few years it appears that "the more we put in the system" ... "The odd one should pop out of the other end" has been the philosophy. I see young Cameron Smith as a good example of this and slightly further back perhaps Lilley and maybe Handley. Going further back, I can't remember many great young players that Leeds have brought into the first team that remain today. Happy of course to be corrected. Ward maybe??

With Leeds track record in Super League and general superior business reputation off the field it appears that at Scholorship level they can generally attract the top players in the area, across all postcodes. Let's call these players 9 out of 10 players and by this they are the very top of their peer group. Teams like Wakefield, generally get left with the 6 out of 10 players, or in other words the poor mix of the "talent" pool.

As I have observed, Wakefield manage to DEVELOP their 6 out of 10 rated players into 8 and 9 out of 10 players by he time they reach the U18 standard. The Leeds players in my view have hardly been developed at all and by the time they get to Under 19 level they have plateaued or in some cases regressed. But the good news for Leeds of course is they know that if they need to go and pinch a Wakefield youngster at Under 19 level they can usually get them. Wakefield do the developing, Leeds get the player. Harsh, but that's life I guess.

I feel if Leeds had a better DEVELOPMENT pathway rather than putting players into a system and seeing who "pops" out then we may see greater fruits and a better pool of players.