As much as it was a good result, lets hope we don't fall in love with ourselves after that, there wasn't much between the two teams until the last few minutes.
Too many errors early in the tackle count.
Too many penalties given away.
No idea with attacking kicks.
No patience near the opposition line.

Still plenty to work on.

Second half was enjoyable...we were poo in the first half, our defence was very very poor, handling errors were under 10's level.
although when we play with confidence we look good with the ball in hand, for me we need a couple more experienced heads..

Has anyone read the T&A article with Beattie today?

Has he seriously said he hopes there is interest in our younger players or has he been misquoted??

I think it's a misrepresentation of the quote. He's bigging up the young lads saying that they're SL quality, but hasn't quite had the eloquence to make his point

I didn't read it the way Ewwen did to be honest, but even if he did say that, it's a statement of the flaming obvious. Our academy sides were beating SL teams in their league last year, and seem to have started this season in the same vein. Given the performances of some ( all....)of the youngsters in the first team and you'd need to be a real dimwit not to realise that bigger clubs are going to be slinking around.

How do we manage to keep young players?

Obviously we can't manage to pay them the same as SL sides so what is it that we do that keep them wanting to stay at the club?

Outside of the basics like paying them every month on the agreed date. I'd say regular first team football. Once they are established first teamers they are off to superleague where they belong. That's a fact of life while we are in the championship.

What I find gutting is seeing Adam O'Brien turning out for Halifax. Not because of any rivalry with them (good luck to them) but because he is genuinely superleague class. He's at the wrong superleague club IMO.

If Ethan Ryan were to leave I'd want to see him ripping it up on the wing in Superleague or NRL getting the show biz billing his finishes deserve.

A few years playing regular first team for us and I'm sure he'll be ready to step in to that level and certainly international honours.

There is no way in hell that Ethan Ryan won't be playing Super League eventually. As well as the spectacular finishes, he is one of the best defensive wingers I've seen in a long time. I wouldn't like to try and count the amount of times his read or a great ball and all tackle has saved certain tries down his side.

I just hope we get a good couple of years out of him before he inevitably moves on. And I won't begrudge him that move either.

From reading this and the comment you were replying to, the best way forward is an open and honest approach. Let players like Ryan, Oakes etc know that if someone comes in and it feels like right time and move for them; we'll let them go. But if it doesn't feel right, they're not quite ready for that level it would be better to have one more season at this level, if they go to Club X they're likely to not get a shot and just get shipped out on dual reg at this stage (i.e. O'Brien) etc etc

Would require players to have a lot of respect and trust in whoever was delivering that message as it could sound like you're just trying to keep them but if we're genuinely looking after the players best interest than it could work. May be being a bit naive here

Maybe we should start insisting on transfer fees for our players then in future. If we are to become a feeder club for super leagues then I would hope we get as much money as is possible.

That was my thought too, but I don't have any easy answers..

It just feels really gutting that we are now, in essence, a feeder club for SL teams. I know all the stuff about 'cutting our cloth' etc etc (it's certainly not that people haven't rammed it down our throats enough!).

But, part of being a supporter is to have that hope that one day we'll be at the top table ourselves again - and if all of our best players are 'inevitably' going to be moving on as soon as they develop, well, what's really the point?