There are people who are always going to be doom and gloom and there are people who just cant see how bad a mess we are in. You sir are the latter, you need to wake up and smell the coffee because we are far closer to Saddened's prophesied relegation fodder than we are to some people's high as a kite 'we can still make the top 4' tripe at the moment.

Hopefully some smart recruitment and a clear out of the crap will fix things up for next year. For me Walsh or someone similar is a start

I remember he chased back once and looked quite quick....... other than that no.

Absolute bloody nonsense. We need a half (preferably 2), a prop (preferably 2) and [isome[/i luck with injuries/better conditioning. That's it. Not great at the moment but hardly the major crisis that all you kneejerk numpties are oh-so predictably sobbing about yet again... "Relegation fodder"? FFS....

Your forgetting we also need to replace at least 1 wing (assuming we rightly let Gardner and Meli sail off into the sunset) and we need to do something about the dead weight that is Hohaia (hoovering up loads of cap space yet delivering nothing).

So

1 winger
2 halves
2 props
Ditch the utility garbage

With the current circumstances with the NRL and Union this is no easy or I suspect quick task.

Oh and I didnt say we were relegation fodder but closer to it than the top , maybe an exaggeration but we've been beaten and beaten fairly by Widnes who are not a good side , London who are also poor and HKR (twice so no fluke) who Wigan pumped for 80. Who are we better than?

exactly, with Robes and J-Lo back we are a decent prop and a halfback away from challenging again. that does speak volumes for the quality of the league ...

No, but with an organiser along side him, I think he could.

No chance. He would look better than he does, as would most of our team but he just isnt a halfback and will always be substandard there. We ideally need a 6 with good distribution to help create a link with the backs, Lomax will do some of that from 1 but if we want to be challenging at the top again we need a genuine 6 (Wheeler if fit would be fine) so we dont end up being predictable. Top teams will soon learn to close down Lomax if we have no other go to player.

Realistically, and ideally, Hanbury would be my 6 next year, here's hoping!

The reason Hanbury excites me so is that he can play 7 or 6 equally well and is a very good allround player, which will help immensley to bring through yougsters like yates or charnock into the halfs when injuries occur. I really hope we get him for next year. REALLY.

I agree sh*te at 6, sh*te at 7.

Come on we can do better than that, he has the look of a lot of players we signed in the 80's and very early 90's.

The love in for him astonishes me. Precisely the sort of player we DON'T need.

Reporter says he's signed. Doesn't say if he's coming over now. I hope he is. That's the dealbreaker for me i.e. if he's not then we should be scouting for a bit longer given League Freak's feedback on him.

So you're the bloke who reads his tripe, I assumed there must be someone who did.

To be fair to him, he's a far harder working version of me. A lot of what he puts is accurate, it's just wrapped up in the whole persona thing. His comments on Walsh are backed up by the likes of Andrew Johns, Mal Meninga, Brett Kimorley and Brad Fittler, who do have some credibility.

It appears to be a very, very risky signing. He has been widely criticised for his performances this season and a lot of the criticism is very worrying. Respected commentators talk of his refusal to take the line on, his inability to organise, the lack of any sort of running game and his positional kicking. In fact the only area of his game that ever gets any praise is his attacking kicks, namely chips to the corner.

I've said previously I've not seen enough of him to make any real judgement on him. But I hope Saints aren't also in that position. If we're signing him because he's the only NRL halfback available, then it could be another costly mistake. We were well and truly stung by Lance Hohaia and his agent and this on the face of it looks like it could be another similar situation. Our desperation for a halfback puts the club in a terrible position.

If thats indeed the case, and he is signed, then we need to welcome it and at least give him a chance, despite (my) reservations about his long kicking game and not taking the line on (he doesn't like being tackled at all apparently).
He may surprise us and be brilliant; in any event he has got to be some improvement.