Well, it's official now. Naughton has signed for Hull FC. No homecoming for Curtis

It's no loss. How's Jason Crookes getting on there?

Time will tell I suppose. Not sure what Crookes has to do with anything.

Well, [ithat[/i wasn't actually on my mind..no, seriously I'm not joking, what I meant was, that it's just the gobby ones tend to act as de-facto captains anyway, so you may as well check out if any of them are [ireally[/i captaincy material since, to be honest, a hard working, top class, experienced church mouse may well be the coaches' first name on the team sheet, but he won't really cut the mustard as skipper.

Incidentally, I don't really agree about Gaskell being the main playmaker; I'd assume that role is going to fall to Siejka as scrum half. I see Lee as running off the plays called by Harry, though I don't for a second feel it spoils his chance of being skipper.

I find it interesting how many hookers & props end up coaching, especially as they usually come across in their playing days as thick &, in props case, hardly ever are captain, though a handful of hookers are. Most captains seem to be HBs, but not that many progress to top level coaches. I wonder if it is a progression from junior days when the outstanding kids who score all the tries are made captain & HBs.

If you really believe that Hide & Seeka is going to be your go to man then your in for a nasty surprise and I hope you have back up in place.
You will be begging for Gale Back by the time the season starts

If they were interested in keeping him maybe, but they got rid. He went to Fev on loan and was dire and they sent him back before his loan period was complete......reading their forums at the time they labelled him as the worst half back ever to represent the club.
He was still under contract for 2015 at wakefield so they may have kept it hush hush to get him off the payroll and maybe get a little transfer fee in the bargain

quinny, looks like you don't rate him then!

This curious feathfield feedback doesn't worry me. He may well have been nursing his injury and will be a different player in 2015.

must be pretty secret if a blogger knows about it.
Jimmy and Steve said they knew how they wanted the scrum half to play and that was the most important selection criterion. thats the benefit of building a team from scratch, no compromising your game plan because you have to accommodate players already in contract, you choose the style first then the player to fit.

I was never one who slated Gale, though there were a few around the place who did and whilst I'd have been far from devastated to have kept him, I don't think he's anyone's dream half either. As for Harry, well we'll wait and see, though we do have a reputation for taking on unfancied young players struggling to reach their high potential before a bad injury set them back. We're probably around fity fifty with those...

I'm not too concerned about how his time at Wakey or Rovers went. He has shown his quality in the past and with the right environment and when fully fit there is every chance he can play like that again.

Just look at Etu Uaisele. For various reasons it didn't work for him at Rovers at all and then he went to Sheffield on loan, has a great time and scores 8 tries in 8 games. His comments in the recent article on the Bulls site were that his career stagnated at Featherstone and he fell out of love with the game.

sssh. Writing reasoned sense won't catch on.

I hear he is a bit of an expert on South East Asian food which will do for me . I look forward to sharing s bowl of pork balls with the young lad in the directors box at some stage next season.