Slightly unrelated, but it looks like McGuire will be the new Cas coach with Delaney as his assistant.

very odd decision imo. you sack lingard you go for experience

You know a transfer is going to happen when Peter Smith is giving him a number in his 30 man squad for next year.

Overall not bad changes in players.

Agreed. Bizarre. Fwiw, I thought Lingard had them moving in the right direction. Time will tell I suppose.

As.good as it's been for many a season, on paper at least.

Not sure I'd agree. "On paper" we've signed a 37 year old winger, one prop with some NRL experience and another with none. Siva might be added, but the reality is we're taking a punt on Arthur's ability to revamp the existing players and spot decent NRL ones.

Wings of Siva and Hall will be very strong but our back division won't exactly be lightning fast. That means to use them we'll need to get good field position and work moves to give them space. That screams structure and planned moves.

Granted the coaching team needs to get them to work as a whole. Everyone has a job and knows what it is, etc. BA clearly started that last term. A stronger by far backline (I'm assuming Sivo arrives), more power up front and a good, hard pre season gives the platform to at least be competitive.

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"We had a good team on paper, unfortunately the game was played on grass." Brian Clough.

Me too. Bai was a terrific signing.

We looked good on paper last season (barring being a big prop short), should have been good enough for top 6 anyway.. nothing guaranteed, but you can only judge on paper at this stage and if Sivo comes in it certainly looks much better than last year no doubt.

We now have 6 props over 17 stone in weight allied to guaranteed metres out of backfield .I know they don't all necessarily play to their size or for enough minutes!
Despite the above we should have enough to give us a completely different platform for our hooker and halves.
In theory on paper we should be finishing sowhere between 4th and 6th as a minimum and the gap to the top 3 should be closer.

Onwards and upwards for sure.

I think our weakest position(s) are half back/7 and centre given Newmans past injuries and Frawleys average ish performances.

Guessing that's why we signed Jake Connor.

If we can keep Holroyd / Gannon and Newman fit/ playable then we really should be pushing top 6 hard.

So are we assuming Handley can learn how to defend as a and learn when to pass if he is centre material how come he's played on the wing for most of his career up to now?

He has a full preseason to pick it up.
It's not the best plan but if Momo is leaving and Hall was already signed it might be the best plan we have.

If it doesn't work we JC who plays best at centre and the academy kid