Am I the only one who wouldn't miss Purtell?
He doesn't have pace, or agility, he's not the best defensively and he doesn't really provide much for his winger.
I thought he had his best games for us when he was playing in the 2nd row. I think that in itself tells you how effective he is (or isn't) as a centre.

For the amount of money he must be costing us, there must be a cheaper option out there somewhere (Platt/Hellewell/Baille?!)

Purtells struggled last couple of weeks. I could see him being on big money too. I'd keep Blythe ahead of him. OK, he's had some brain farts but he runs hard and keeps his legs pumping.

I think Purtell standing out as a better player is probably down to the drop in form of those around him.

As for next year, I'd also look at Danny Bridge, I liked him when he was on loan - meat and drink kind of player who could tackle.

It will all come down to money. If we have a quiet chat with player and agent about still paying a good wage next year - as long as it stays private - we may just hang onto some of them. I am not surprised at Gaskell. Stay here and be first choice or move to keep the bench warm. That may go for a few of this squad. Would Olbason, Donno and Addey get a starting place in any of the top 6 SL clubs. They would be bench players in that first year. We thought Kaufusi was very good but he sits in the stand. Why not offer them a similar contract to now with a release clause if we don't get back up say within two seasons. We need to spend the full cap (legally) next year and choose a hand full of players who we really want - such as Kearney, Manu, Fakir etc. and they get paid separately for opening supermarkets by one of our sponsors which isn't part of the cap. We will have the money. About £900k payment + parachute payment spread over say two years means we will have enough to keep the squad we have as long as that last few £K disappear off the accounts. The other clubs do it.

I would also take Sammut back. The top clubs have never been interested in him due to his inconsistent nature and not really running the team like a conventional half. He will always interest the bottom clubs who need a spark.

Still waiting for the assistant to be named. I will be bitterly disappointed if we don't get one as Jimmy does need good support. Either a tough ex forward or a back who will sort out our poor defence is required asap.

Don't know where people are getting these figures from. Central distribution next year is 500-600k. Then there's a one off 250k parachute payment. Everyone seems to think the combined total is the parachute payment and we then get central money on top. Central funding plus parachute payment will cover bulk off the 900k salary cap, assuming green makes parachute payment available to fund squad and doesn't have other uses for it in mind.

One advantage we will have next year is club trained rule coming in which means only first 40k of any of our academy products wages will count towards salary cap. Provided money's there to fund it, means we've some scope to exceed the 900k cap legally, and we've probably got a much higher number of ex academy lads floating around than majority of clubs.

Burgii...?

updated for TnA article today, Olbison, would like to stay as spent 6 years here, "playing it by ear for now"

Olbison reminds me of Worrincy. Runs outstanding attacking lines. But is lacking in a lot of other areas. His defence his very poor for a second rower (he missed 9 tackles on Sunday!!) has no off-load game and rarely breaks a tackle and can give soft penalties away.

Does make me laugh declaring he would like to stay. Realistically, would any SL club want him? I think he will do well in the championship.

We'll apparently Leeds are sniffing round olbison and Roberts. Maybe they see something your missing.

Scruton has signed a 2 year extension at Wakey. Good bit of business for them, I think a lot of people assumed he would be off at the end of the season.
Also rules out any possibility of us re-signing him, obviously.

With us certs for the drop there was no chance of getting Scruton.

Olbison is a championship level player. He's a good lad and a really conscientious trainer. Roberts has his whole career in front of him and has barely played 1st team yet. Neither are SL class though Roberts has it in him. If Leeds want Olbison then let them have him.

It was one bad day at the office tackle wise for him. his tackles made to missed ratio for the season is 10%. Last season it was about 15% so a big improvement from him in a worse team. But on the attacking side, he is second tryscorer, second for clean breaks, 7th for tackle busts. Agree about few offloads, but the other side of that is a low number of errors. No team has 17 complete players. I can see plenty of reasons to keep him for SL2.

The reason is that they had to assemble a squad at the very last minute, a mistake they aren't making again judging from their activity. Given the fact that the only luck we get these days is bad luck, you can forgive me for fretting that we could sleep walk into making the same mistake ourselves.

The only slight reassurance I have over our 2015 recruitment (and it is only slight) is that Marc openly acknowledges the issue in the program notes.
We've not heard a peep out of Steve Ferres recently, hopefully he's been hard at work and the club are just waiting for the right time to unleash good news (normally around the same time as some bad!).

Updated for Adam Henry TnA article today. Cue debate. interesting point in TnA article, that he was to be a squad player to be developed rather than first choice, but has played more due to injuries etc etc. Again like Olbison attacking stats far superior to defence, if he can improve next year as much as Olbison did this year then he should be therebouts in the missed tackle ratio for a wide player.
What I would like to see is Donaldson or equivalents ie defensive back rower/centres showing some commitment, otherwise its going to 50 - 45 type scores next season hopefully in our favour.