Trying to get an available proven half back is like dragons teeth these days, can,t see any team willing to release one unless there is a big financial gain.
It might be easier to sign up and develop Eden,s defensive game at full back and get Lomax working at 6 with Walsh.

I think we'd miss lomax at fullback tbh. He's vital in the way we play as he comes in wide as a extra half or can also take the line on. Lomax isn't the greatest of halves IMO and the extra room he gets at fullback really fits his game. He become very predictable at 6 with his dummy and step inside and also stopped the ball going wide.

Lomax is the perfect fullback for us.

I cannot see Wigan letting Hampshire go other than for a fee we would baulk at paying. I think you can confine this one to mischief making though I'd love to be wrong. Nobody I have spoken to, who are usually not far away with comings and goings, have heard anything about it.

Burns I don't know anything about apart from our initial interest and it all appears to be very quiet on the incomings front whilst the 'Walsh home' rumours won't go away.

But, supposing you have 3 years from burns that is, at a minimum:

Hohaia/ Walsh this year
Burns/ Walsh next year
Burns/ new 7 the year after (potentially)
New 6/ new 7 2 years after that

Which can hardly be described as stable! If Walsh stays longer than his initial contract, it becomes much less of an issue. But I'd just love us to have a halfback combo we can keep together for 5+ years!

So at it's bluntest, Walsh is a stop gap for us to get some long term halfbacks in place!

This is all conjecture of course, who knows what saints plan is but brown generally does very well identifying halfbacks, so we shall see!

Extrapolating on what our CEO said recently I would imagine Walsh is effectively a stop gap until we can raise our own rather than get any in. I've no idea whether there are any up and coming halfbacks at Saints these days. We seem to have disposed of them all.

There are 2 who seem to crop up more than any other:

Charnock, who seems to be moved and getting groomed for a ball handling 13 rather than a halfback; and

Hewitt, whose 17 - was picked for the England game recently vs France, but I'd hazard a guess he's still going to be too young to get a game any time soon...

Oh don't get me wrong, signing Walsh was great, 2 years or not.

Ultimately 6. Burns 7. Walsh, or any other player mentioned in the last few pages are steps in the right direction, given the options we had over the last few years. It's only personal preference to bring someone in to build our structures around!

I think the idea of keeping anyone who's got genuine NRL quality will be difficult to do for long periods.
I know E Mc mentioned something about Penrith still contributing to his wages, this may be how we've managed to get him under the cap and once this agreement come to an end, we may not be able to afford to keep him.
However, I'm not 100% sure about that situation and if Walsh settles here, with the lack of media spotlight, we may be able to tie him down for longer.

It's like that with any overseas players. If they settle, if they play well, if they been a success, if they win things, if they get another shot at NRL etc

The fact Walsh made comment that he had a get out Clause (true or not) suggests he wasn't totally convinced on coming. The is clearly some strong rumours which the club denied that he's not settled which ain't going away it seems.

I've spoke to players at the club about this and I'd like to think he would see his two years out but all depends on how his family get on between now and the end of the season.

I know Walsh IS happy to stay and enjoying it but that doesn't mean he will stay.

Yeah definitely - he'll be lining up with his current team mates and fellow departees James Green and Jordan Cox.

Oh hang on...

Either that or he wanted a safety net in case it all went wrong. It was a big step for him and his wife to come over here without ever having set foot in the country when they have family, friends, etc back home, and it's always tougher for the partners because they don't have the network in place that the men do to meet people and get to know the ropes of living here. But only time will tell if he stays for the length of his contract. I'm taking no notice of the rumours anymore. He'll be here for this season anyway and so I'll enjoy having him with us until I hear anything different from the club.