It doesn't matter how rich they are - they are clearly not as inclined as Wire's lot to put their hands in their pockets for transfer fees for whatever reason. I hardly think we can criticise them for that fact. That isn't about Saints' ambition as a club - it is about how a few rich individuals on the board decide they want to spend their spare cash.



As above.

I'm not going to look thru every transfer and signing in the last 5 years, I'm not as boring as you

But don't try and tell me the hasn't been a centre available since willie talau left, dont tell me the has been no halves available in the last 3 years Since longy left etc

Why did McManus come out and tell us saints fans that we will have a team to grace the stadium?

Isn't that pretty much what I said?

I've just said that the Warrington boards are prepared to pay transfer fees and we are not, I'm pretty sure that indicates that have more ambition as a club.

No - I'm pretty sure it just indicates that they have more individuals involved with the club willing to spend their own money on signing players than we do. That does not equate to more ambition "as a club". I am not fully au fait with the relative board makeups of Saints and Wire and all of their personal circumstances, but I'm willing to bet that the rich geezers funding Wire's transfer fees are a lot more closely involved in the ownership and day-to-day running of the club than our bulgey-pocketted types are.

You don't think the wolves have more ambition than us?

They signed king, Atkins when we was looking for a centre.

They signed Joel Monaghan when we've needs wingers.

They signed myler when we needed a scrumhalf.

They beat us to the signing of carvell.

They beat us to the signing of Trent Waterhouse.

They beat us to the signing of Hill.

They beat us to the signing of Ratchford.

Just a few names of players that WAS available when we required them and we was in the mix for most.

Over the last couple of years our board has stumped up significant amounts of cash to fund the building of the stadium and the absorption of the club's debts. Before next season they'll be stumping up more to put up the cladding that everyone's been clamouring for. I suspect you'll see that once these extraordinary expenses are out of the way and the stadium is bringing in steady money that we'll start competing in the transfer market where fees are involved.

I'll also say that we shouldn't underestimate just how difficult the recruitment situation must have been after losing Eastmond and Graham at the same time, which left us needing to replace two of our best players. The problem was particularly tricky, as both players were British, but neither could realistically be replaced from within the British game. Given that we've been forced to fill up our non-fed quota by replacing those players from overseas, we've been sorely restricted in our options for strengthening the rest of the squad.

Having said all that, we clearly didn't manage this difficult situation terribly well. The Hohaia signing has been a real balls up, and I suspect that if Simmons had known how far Gaskell was going to come on in the months following the signing he may not have bothered with it. Laffranci is a good player, but one who probably isn't being used in the best possible way.

It's not ideal, but I think we need to acknowledge the rough luck the club has had. Everyone is crying out for a big rough prop and a halfback with a kicking game. If Kyle and Jammer hadn't have left (and by all accounts we did everything we could to keep them) we'd have both of those things and two free quota spaces to play with.

We had Soliola and Gidley already signed up to play centre when Atkins was signed. When King was signed we already had a full overseas quota and he was, by all accounts, on loony money that we would have struggled to compete with without Wire's accountants.



Freak signing, freak timing, doesn't count. Wire had to pay off whatsisname's entire remaining contract to get him on the quota. Again - money we can't afford.



We had Eastmond, Pryce and Wheeler. No brainer.



etc. etc. etc.

...and we're back to the fact that Warrington have more money and seemingly more flexible cap space than we do. That doesn't mean "more ambition". It just means "more money".... If you want to argue "we have more money than Warrington do really so should be competing more for signings with them" then start another thread and go argue yourself to a standstill there.

That post is full of excuses mate. Freak signing, no quota etc


You still aint answered my question.

Do you think we have more ambition than Warrington?

It's a never ending argument this one. The fanboy do-gooders who can see now wrong in anything the club does who believe we're fantastic and about to win trophies again. Then we've got the realists who can see we're making a complete mess of our attempts to get back into the hunt for trophies.

It's pointless justifying our lack of trophies by saying we're third. The competition is so weak we would have to do something truly remarkable to finish below 6th. We've got that third position (So far) by falling back on the oldest players in the side and removing a lot of the youth we hung our cap on as the new breed. It's not a great way to plan your future.

Next season? Slightly worse than this if we don't sign anyone else? Wello will be even more of a farce, Meli will have no need to play for a contract, we still won't have a kicking game or enough props. In reality it's likely to take another 10+ years or a change of ownership for us to get back amongst the trophies.

I saw this coming 5/6 years ago when we stopped signing quality on and was brain washed in to how good our youth is and it will win trophies for the next ten years.

The problem being, I don't see much youth about at the moment.

Don't get me wrong, with a lot of luck we could win the grand final but we'd have to be on the top of our game while the other team would need a off day as it will be Wigan or Warrington if we was to get to old Trafford.

My point in all this, you need to build on success and not get complacent when winning cups, teams should strive to be better and that comes with good signings.

Manchini is saying the same thing at the moment with city, they need to build on winning the league last year as the likes of utd, Chelsea and nal will come back stronger.

I think we lost sight of that when we was winning trophies.