Confirmation on the YEP that Blake Austin has a deal for 2023

Sounds more like it was 2 years when he signed with the option for either party to pull out, rather than an extension.

With the halves staying the same hopefully funds for front row/centre are freed up with Thompson, Dwyer, Broadbent, Briscoe and Mellor going. Next to announce some strong recruitment...

Hope he’s cheap for your sake! Very meh player, only showed up about every 3/4 weeks for us.

He’s actually going ok for us IMO, he seems to be more of a ‘leader’ than i thought he would be

If Hardaker and Martin stay I would rather see the salary cap from the 5 players above spent on 2 top metre making forwards.
I think we are sufficiently covered elsewhere!

The article and quotes were very open ended weren't they.

Nothing confirmed solid by the club yet either. Perhaps Austin has a deal in his favour and is yet to decide if he's taking it or not

I'm not sure. But the article was all over the shop. By that i mean Hetheringtons quotes.

put austin in 2nd row ,get rid of martin get big prop

Brilliant! Then I suppose we can play the big prop at half back?

Deary me.

no we can also get a quality hb unless
you are happy with the 2 cast offs

By definition any player not produced by the club is somebody's cast off, so not sure who you are referring to? I can't fault Austin for effort this season and though if we had the cap space I'm sure we could do better, at the moment prop has got to be the priority. What I can't understand is why you ditch Martin - one of our better players this year - and put Austin in his position. Austin defends like a halfback, which is fine if you are a halfback. Second row is something else entirely.

sezer , austin , martin , prior, tetevano all not good enough if we've any aspirations , we have 2 tackling 2nd rows in gannon and bentley would like a running one next to one of them

I don't think your assessment of all those players is correct, but like anything, it's a matter of opinion. I get the feeling you've been watching the club over a similar time frame to me, so you'll understand when I say that the type of clear out you are talking about would require Alf Davies level spending, not just in recruitment, but also compensation. Just can't be done under the salary cap as it stands. We're going to have to hope the new coach has a touch of Graham Murray about him. I genuinely rate some of the young players (I know you don't) and I think they, and some very selective recruit, are the only way out of the current mess.

all true and i certainly don't take a win or defeat the same way as 10/20/30 yrs ago - the trophy days were good but i.m still craving a bit more entertainment. and the recruitment over the last 10 yrs whether gh or ks hasn't been up to the preceding 10 ,. Some of the youngsters look good but does look like walkers initially pace had gone and have to hope newman doesn't break down again as he's our main strike player ,. The overseas players individually aren't the worst but as a group no one does anything outstanding , prior and martin were better when they arrived

I think he’s gone OK, and tried to stand up in a bit of adversity. It could also be a reflection that the club doesn’t think young Sinfield is far away and don’t want to put a long term roadblock in his way.

The main issue is that if Austin gets another and Martin (deservedly imo) gets another year that makes recruiting the props we need very difficult.