Reminds me a bit of (and sorry for saying a dirty word...) Man Yoo in the football. Everyone was banging on about Fergie not bothering to replace his Dad's Army midfield golden generation of 'Giggsy' and the 'Ginger Ninja' and the Vidic and Ferdinand at the back when they were clearly on the wane, but still in the team. When Moyes then took charge he was left taking the blame for Fergie's lack of action before and was sacked.

This sort of feels similar - no obvious plan / heirs to take over from the likes of JP, JJB, Sinners, KL and Danny Mc. If they wait until those lot have gone, to some degree it will be too late as they generally are on the wane now.

Right now, next season looks like one of transition - I think if we don't have anyone lined up to replace these lot then to some degree it could be a 'lost' season. As it currently stands, the squad haven't performed as well this year as last and there is nothing to suggest the golden generation will perform better next year.

May as well get in / play potential replacements a bit more and come 4th/5th rather than stick with the old guns all the time and come 4th / 5th.

Next year won't be transition because we'll plod along with the same team playing the same way. They'll look at this season and all the narrow defeats and put finishing 6th and going out of the playoffs down to the CC, no biggie.

Man United is a good comparison, the difference is we can't just go out and sign up a bunch of players, we have to develop them. Which means we have to always plan 2/3 years ahead. I don't think gawwy has done that.

In 2/3 years peacock, leuluai, sinfield burrow mcguire JJb will all be gone. Some obviously more immediatly than others (peacock and leuluai) We have no one to replace any of them, apart from cuthbertson.

This is what I mean - I know they don't have much money to go out and get 'big players' in to replace them - I think they should either get some decent, young prospects from elsewhere (whether Championship, other SL teams or Aus) on relatively cheap money and then give them decent game time the next year or so so that when those people do retire, the 'step down' in quality isn't as large because the young'uns have had a year or so of exposure.

Ideally (from a financial perspective) these 'heirs to the throne' would come from within the academy already but there aren't loads of brightly shining stars that have come through this season.

I guess (back to football again) what the likes of Man Yoo do is to get good young prospects from 'lower down the chain' and blood them in over a couple of years. It'd be great to go out and get a couple of currently-quality players but next season I'd have more patience watching a team in transition if the tranisition being seen was of younger people coming in, rather than older people getting a bit worse again from this season. Going in to 2016 I would then be more optimistic. To persist all the time with the older generation through 2015 seems like a waste of a year because then there is even more tranisitioning that will need to happen in 2016. May as well crack on sooner rather than later.

I would say that over the last 4 years this is what we've done with people like Achurrhc, moore, Griffin and Hauraki. We have also had young lads come in from the academy.

The common theme is that none of these have been given an extended run in the team. The potential is still there for Ward, SIngleton, Achurch, and even Clarkson, but it how we can give them that platform to start showing themselves off.

In some cases that may be a loan to a lower SL team. In others it may be a case of sitting down with the senior player in their position and saying that they are a squad player, and no-one is an automatic pick anymore, and that the club is looking out for the future.

Thats not throwing the senior players out of the squad, they will still get games they will still be at the club, but it may allow players that have been stiffled a bit over the last couple of years to get to prove their ability

Forgot about Griffin. Easy to do.

Bet you forgot about ben cross too?

Alarming the poor quality of some of the signings over recent seasons.

One could also throw in the likes of Chris Feather, Wayne MacDonald and Jamie Thackray. How far back do you want to go?

I remembered Cross, but thought he came in during Blueys time here

Hetherington does the recruitment IMO.

We have had some garbage recent years but also had some crackers too, all teams do i suppose.Although most recent few years the quality seems to be drying up.I can only think of Hardaker and maybe Aiton over last 4 years who could be considered good business.

The bad recruitment has been offset somewhat due to our continued success and great core of players who always seem to step up. But GH and his 'skills' in the market are going to be required very soon if he wants to see us remain amongst the top 4 from next year.We will need to steer clear of the likes of Griffin,Achurch,and Cross type signings.

Briscoe and Moon are good signings too in my opinion. Though I'm mostly concerned about our forwards especially at prop. I think we've let some decent props go over the years (Scruton, Burgess, Amor etc and not replaced them. So now that we need someone to take some workload off Peacock & Leuluai we don't have anyone.
Though hopefully Cuthbertson will be one.
Another good prop for the year after, then a halfback signing and I think we'll be fine.

Yes i agree i have overlooked them 2 off the top of my head.Moon is a class act as far as SL centres go.Still not sure Briscoe was a signing we needed to make but at his best he is an excellent player and i think he has plenty more to give for us so it can't be classed as bad business yet.

I Believe luke Burgess would have gone sooner or later anyway with all his bros. Being at Souths.Amor, i have always been quite miffed at allowing him to go after his stint at Wakey.

I agree with all that. On Amor I don't think it was the monumentally terrible decision that some people seem to think it was but I think we missed out on, at worst, a perfectly decent prop who would've helped during the transition of our top props.

Wayne McDonald was outstanding in 2004, that version of McDonald would walk into the current line up.

Cross was a Hetherington/McClennan signing but was given his debut by McDermott, leaving the new coach to praise his application but bemoan his lack of ability.