You are entitled to it but I wholeheartedly disagree (sometimes aggressively so, when feeling provoked ). That said, a good academy can somewhat mitigate the challenges faced by the whipping boy clubs, and a poor one can exacerbate them. Rovers’ has not offered a good return on investment over getting on for 15 years and I do hope that changes. Obviously we’ll struggle to hold onto good players when it is only ever the same handful of clubs that win trophies and stretch the limits of the cap, but even so. If it doesn’t improve, there’s always the example of Cas who got much better when they focused less on academy products… as a consolation hope.

Maybe it is just a bit of a broken sporting ecosystem. I don’t think one set of clubs is more to blame than any other.

It does feel like a bit of dead end though. I mean there’s Leeds fans being newly bored, that’s quite funny. But it is finding interest in other people’s boredom!

The big 5 European football leagues are dominated by small numbers of clubs. Bayern Munich have won the last 10 German titles, Juventus won Serie A 9 times in a row before Inter an Milan won one a piece, PSG have won 8 of the last 10 in France. Atletico Madrid have only twice broken the Real Madrid-Barcelona duopoly since Valencia were Spanish Champions in 2004. So it isn’t just us.

I’m sure those champion clubs have good cultures too, and tell fans of Stuttgart, Montpellier, Empoli and Celta Vigo all about it, and how they should be doing more to make their leagues more competitive. I’m sure they appreciate the advice just as much as I do that of fans of Wigan and St Helens.

If Lewis continues to progress, and Rovers go with ‘patience’ rather than ‘ambition’ or our ambition is just constrained by finances, then at some point it seems likely he might want the professional satisfaction of competing for trophies. Like LMS and Tony Clubb, as examples that spring randomly to mind. Being associated with winning teams in his prime will also likely secure him the option of better deals later in his career.

You make a good point about structured pathways. Saints and Wigan can run through the season on cruise control, giving youngsters confidence without too much pressure. They’ll still be top 4. If the lad makes a mistake you win by 10 rather than 16 (or 30 rather than 36), or even if you lose this game you’ll win 20 others. Our youngsters make a mistake, and it costs us a win when we might have to wait a month for another, or they lose in each of their first four appearances… it’s a tough route. And maybe that job as a landscape gardener and playing part-time for Doncaster starts to feel more attractive. In other sports underdog teams are reputed to raise their games against top teams, but in SL they’re more seen as a ‘free hit’ and the attitude is increasingly for teams to save themselves for more winnable games. It’s teams like Rovers that are targeted as beatable. The way around all that is maybe to go for loan deals to the Championship… but without much or any SL experience we’re sending them to Workington and Cornwall so they’re not winning even at that level!

When was the last time Saints or Wigan signed a highly rated young player from another SL team? Certainly in recent years all of Saints signings have been either from the NRL, or the lower divisions. We went through a phase of signing established SL journeymen during the Cunningham era, but I can’t really think of anything similar to Jake Truman for example. Agitating and disrupting highly talented juniors tend to be a Warrington trait (see Matty Nicholson, they were pushing for Truman last year etc). On the specific Lewis example, Saints have Dodd and Wigan Smith, so I think it’s unlikely there’s a risk of poaching.

Part of the reason Saints and Wigan have been successful is they tend to be able to pay less than market value for the players coming through their academy, giving them deeper squads, and pick and choose the opportunities they give. They also tend to be more patient. Ben Davies had to wait until 23 for his chance this year with Saints, same with Sam Royle whom HKR have just

Bateman to Wigan from Bradford would qualify there tbf.

That was 2013 wasn’t it? 9 years sort of proves the point. I’m not saying never but it’s not really how either teams recruitment strategy works!

You both have a tendency to suck them up at junior level, it's no wonder they have stars in there eye

Do you not realise that St Helens is only a small town. Wigan, Warrington are triple the size in population. Leeds & Hull are massive cities.

You can also pay less than us (for example) for pretty much any player; we have to pay a relative premium because we don’t offer trophies… which then feels a bit self-fulfilling. Even if we do outbid you, we’re getting somebody more motivated by money than by winning.

The number of academy products in Saints team is genuinely impressive. I don’t want to underestimate all the hard work that goes on behind the scenes. But it doesn’t feel like you’re reliant on it. If you had a few fallow years, you could pay fees to fill the gap and that provides confidence even if you don’t have to do it.

The academy is a good place to invest extra cash, once you’re already spending up to the cap. Diverting money away from the first team makes less sense if you’re not and when your day-to-day SL existence is dreary in a good year and excruciating in a bad year, and those kids whose confidence isn’t ruined will likely leave to compete higher up the table. Fwiw, our club CEO completely disagrees with me and is fully bought in to the Saints model, so I get to be right or happy… if we stay in SL long enough to test the theory. The Rovers fans nearly all seem to be on board with it too. If Rovers can generate enough revenue to field and maintain a strong first team, then a strong academy would be a very valuable complement. Maybe with the ground purchase and potential development, [imaybe[/i it’ll become possible. I don’t think ‘academy first’ is likely to work. We need it all together and for that we’d need an initial and substantial injection of capital that will never see a financial return. On top of what the current owner already puts in.

I would be curious to know how much more Saints have spent on their academy over the last 10 years and compare it with Rovers’ spend. Have we spent much less than you (I assume so, but would like to know the difference) or just spent it much, much less effectively… or both?!

St Helens have turned a second rower from York into the best second rower in the country by a country mile. A guy who is in his mid 20’s. This proves my point about the coaching set up.

All eyes are on Hull FC who are currently tearing up the academy. It will be interesting to see if any of those end up as quality first teamers. I tell you what though, the Wigan academy is currently in the lower end of the table but I guarantee some of that academy team will end up as quality first team players for Wigan

This is a more interesting argument. It’s definitely easy to get into a logic loop of “do the two academies attract the best young players because they’re most likely to become professional players, or are the two academies most likely to produce professional players because they attract the best young players”?

I know Saints put a lot into attracting the youngsters they want. Before Covid the Australia tour was seen as a massive incentive to join. I don’t know how other clubs approach attracting young talent and it’s very much back to MildRovers original hypothesis of money which may be a differentiating factor. I suspect Saints and Wigan spend the most in junior rugby and coaching. The question is is the likely difference more or less than say what Warrington have spent on marquees

I always remember watching a game at Rylands quite a few years with quite a lot of young talent on show. Spoke to quite a few of the players parents and shocked to hear them say we don't want our lads signing up in the Warrington Scholarship we want them to go through the Saints set up because they will develop into better players.

And its still going on today, Saints have signed up quite a few Rylands players because they are attracted to the club culture they might not play for the first team but its their preferred option to be that better player.

All very interesting but it's all down to cold hard cash

Take all that cold hard cash away (salary cap) and the result would be the same Wigan and Saints would still dominate:

This is the saints team with all the money taken away and you can only spend use the academy production line and championship level:

1. Bennison
2. Grace
3. Percival
4 Davies
5. Makinson
6. Lomax
7. Dodd
8. Walmsley
9. Roby
10. Lees
11 Knowles
12. Batchelor
13. Welsby