Should be coming into his prime, and in addition to tackling work rate he has footballing ability to play as a ball playing loose forward in same vein albeit not as good as O'Loughlin. He has more talent than any of our current back rowers. Will be on higher salary Than Achurch and with passing skills could take strain from the role Cuthbertson has played of late as a pivot. Worth a gamble in my book. 12 months ago was in england squad.

...and 12 months ago was England's backrower by some distance, although that's as much a reflection on how dire the others were as how good he was.

I think if you look at the qualities and character of the players leaving the club for sure and the posdibility JJB also struggling to return then perhaps having a guy with Westermsn's reputation coming in doesn't fill me with confidence.

A lot of people took the p!ss over Westermans 5 or 6 knock ons when we played them at the KC most recently, including myself, but the reality is he broke our line a few times and if he had kept hold of them then he would have scored a hat trick at least. That is worth a punt for sure.

Potentially the best back row in the country over the next couple of years.

I'll be very surprised if Westerman would be on the same sort of money as Achurch - Achurch has been one VERY expensive mistake. He's lucky he didn't come with a big name (ala Mullins, Clyde) or he'd have been hammered much more on here. He is one of our very top earners.

I'd guess we'll be able to afford a Westerman type player and have plenty of money left over for contract upgrades or towards other signings.

Very underwhelmed if true as for comparisons with Zak he has knuckled down and was already part of our system actually "buying in" a problem child is somewhat different imo.
In terms of his quality well he may be an upgrade on Achurch but i'd take Ward ,Ablett and Delaney over him all day.
For me i'd much prefer us to go after Oli Holmes at Cas plus with Baldwinson coming back he can switch to BR comfortably imo.

reading between the lines over here he does look as though he might be on his way, imo think hes a decent player who always looks as though he could do better but always puts a decent spell in,still young though but would imagine be on a good wack money wise

How do you know he's one of our top earners? I'd be very surprised if he was.

I've also been told a while ago that Achurch is one of our higher earners, from a reliable source. Obviously you can take or leave that. But when Gary brought him over he was saying he'd be an England international before the end of the year. I'd actually be surprised if an NRL club took him on at his current salary, and we might have to keep paying some of it next year even if he moves, but we can at least free up some cap by cutting loose.

When it was first announced he was joining us, Phil Gould mentioned when commentating on a Panthers game that they'd really wanted to keep him, but that he'd been offered 'silly money' by Leeds....

Add to that a few fairly loose lips and it's not that difficult to find out vague information if you have an idea of what it is you want to know...

He's probably right.

Achurch has been dreadful for a man of his size, he should be killing it. But he's a modern day Wayne McDonald.

I've never seen him have a good game.

With all due respect to Wakefield and players that have left us to them - you would have expected Achurch to have done the same for more game time and to PLAY RL - UNLESS he dug his heels in over salary and stuck it out a la Winston Bogarde.

gary can't get everything right

barrie mac was bought in with a bad rep and was still on thin ice when loaned to bramley

I would reckon Westerman on circa £100k a year at fc. I bow to others with more insight but always thought Achurch was a kind of project signing and therefore assumed not on a big salary. Is Achurch off contract at end of this year or does he have 1 more year?

One more year I think.

He would be a good signing as long he fits in and isn't signed instead of a hooker.