What are the odds on a bottom 4 finish? We're doomed, doomed I tell ya!
Hopefully we'll get some good news sooner than later. We should be able to bring in a minimum of three players, so a halfback, prop and second row, and possibly a centre if we're really lucky.

With a squad list like that it seems that you will have a very heavy reliance on a number of very young and inexperienced kids. You need at least 4 or 5 more experienced players (not necessarily world class) to avoid another season similar (if not worse) than this one.

TBH, if I were a Bulls fan, I'd be looking to pick up some quality experience (the likes of Furner was fantastic at Leeds) to bolster the team for 2 years, with the emphasis being on a return to the playoffs not next year but the year after.

If the kids have potential, then don't knock it out of them by overplaying them when they are too young or physically immature to handle it.

ps, I wonder if Nick Scruton is wondering if he made the right decision in leaving Leeds???

I dread to think what the Bradford side of 5 years ago would do to that team. Major investment needed, must have loads of room on the cap though?

We need backs more than forwards imo

Really worried by the lack of good rumours, usually there's a few names floating about but this year when we need IMO 4 new players there doesn't seem to be any of those 'worse kept secret type signings'

The problem is, there are no real quality players available for next season. However, as it stands there are a lot out of contract at the end of next season.

Well there's the long running rumour that we've signed an injury prone fullback who missed the whole of this season with an injury.

Doesn't that make you feel more optimistic? Me neither

I suspect Macca would go for a bit of shuffle with that line up - Platt at FB, Crookes into the Centre and Halley on the Wing

Truth us that we are looking paper thin at present. Like every team we will no doubt get injuries. On the law of averages, you get maybe one person who does their cruciate or something and is out for the season, plus two or three with long term injuries and more still with week-to-week knocks and bangs. The line up given above effectively only has 18 players - since it is obvious that the coach doesn't want to play Crossley or Hyde and Olbison is also totally unproven (if you blink you missed his brief cameo)

We certainly need at least five or six new faces to bolster the squad as it above. Anything less and - with injuries - we are going to be throwing in people that either MacNamara doesn't think are ready or who he just doesn't rate

I think now it would be crazy to consider Platt at fullback and Halley on the wing unless it was absolutely necessary.

After last season, I think it would be best considering Platt to be a centre who can cover fullback, rather than the other way around. Halley has also just won the Player Of The Year at fullback, so moving him to the wing is not only a little odd, but won't do much for sending the right message to the squad (i.e. "it doesn't matter how well you play in a position, I may relegate you anyway", which IMO a move from fullback to the wing, is a relegation, much like moving someone from the halves to the wing).

While anything is possible, I fail to see why you would suspect this. Leaving Crookes out of the equation, there were plenty of opportunities to play Platt at full back and Halley on the wing in the latter part of the season. Rightly, they were not taken, and Platt did not start at FB even when Halley was injured.


I really dislike the tendency of Bradford supporters to assume that because something hasn't happened, it never will. If the coaches thought Crossley and Hyde were not ready this season, I see no reason to assume that they won't be ready next season. We had this with Horton, too, and Medley explicitly said he didn't think his defence was good enough [uyet[/u. You may agree or disagree with the coaches' assessments of specific young players, but juniors [uby definition[/u need to reach a point when they are ready, the coaches are in the best position to assess this, and if they are not deemed to have done so yet, there's no reason simply to assume that they don't want to play them.

Specifically re Hyde, don't forget that he was injured for a lengthy spell, which may have stymied a chance or two, or at least delayed this readiness.

IMO Crossley and Hyde weren't ready for SL last year.

If Crossley's lost some lard and put on some muscle by 2010 then he he'll have more of a chance.

There is a lot of work to do rebuilding next years squad as we all know. Some of this work will be either well underway or even complete, and just awaiting finalising and announcing. My take on this is that looking at how we and McNamara have put squads together over recent years we tend to have two players for each position (with the exception of half back where we generally have 3 to cover 2 places with the third being able to play elsewhere too, and 2nd row where we employ as many as we can

)

This usually gives us our first team squad of 25 plus a couple. With this thinking my reckoning on how it looks so far is below, taken from last years players with first team numbers plus our 2 confirmed signings, and we will be recruiting internally or externally where there is a ?....IMHO and working with the assumptin that Semi is off;

FB - Halley - Hyde
W - Sheriffe - ?
C - Nero - (Straugheir?)
C - Platt - Crookes
W - ? - ?
SO - Sykes - ?
SH - Deacon
P - Lynch - Scrutton
H - Le'strange - Godwin
P - Kopzcak - Crossley
SR - Menzies - Whitehead - Olibson
SR - Hall - Worrincy - Tate
LF - Langley - Donaldson


So, just another way of showing we are short of numbers - we can't name a 25 man first team squad yet, but I fully expect the club to announce at least 4 new signings, with 3 being backs (including a winger if Semi is off) and maybe one prop or 2nd row, and I suspect I'll be able to put a name in place of each ? sooner rather than later.

The problem is the waiting for the positive news...