It looks like we we odds on to sign George Hirst from Oldham and were stunned when he opted for Wigan instead.

We then signed Ben Russell as an afterthought to cover the 2nd row position after we missed-out on Hirst.

I watched the game on Sunday and Russell was very average, and doesn`t have age on his side to develop.

Hopefully we will be surprised how well he plays for Wire in 2025 for us.

I hope you are right, like I said earlier I’m hoping coaches see something we don’t. My only real concern is he has taken the last quota spot and we are stuck with that and it would be hard to replace him with someone from here.

Imagine writing that without checking out the facts.

Your players will get praise once they start winning trophies.

Strange watching Russell. I kept wanting him to get his hands on the ball but he kept being the dummy runner (and usually a bit too early & flat). They actually scored from two moves where he was missed out. He is big and on the very few times he took the ball up he made a bit more ground than I thought he would. No crunching tackles but did make several tackles ... usually low. He actually popped up on the wing to score a try which was disallowed for being forward ... perhaps he was a bit flat again. Nothing to get everyone wild with excitement but I have been wrong before. Sam will need to shove a rocket up his rear end.