I don't think the "bring back Price" chant will catch on. Mind you our defence is definitely not so good.

Not saying that , but surely you should have been looking at a small improvement from last year, and def not backwards steps?

I think it’s fair to say that there are some stars in the squad, more than most squads in the league.

Ratchford, Charnley, Widdop, Williams, Cooper, Clark, Currie, Philbin are all England internationals. Williams and Widdop in particular we’re superstars when signing for us, but haven’t replicated their success here.

Realistically, if a coach could get the best out of the above group, you could put shirts on traffic cones and they would be competitive.

The board have invested, spending the cap + marquees. There should be an expectation for them to be competitive, anything less just wouldn’t warrant the investment.

Let me be clear, again. I’m not having a pop at Powell. I am questioning the logic of the appointment. There are very few indicators that Powell could have prolonged and consistent success here. He did well at Featherstone, then into Cas where he he did ok, especially in one or two seasons, but more often than not missed the play offs. There’s no evidence of being a great leader of men, like Wane for example, who put his stamp on a group instantly. There is no real evidence that he can play knock out rugby, often failing to reach the latter stages if competitions. There is no defensive steel to be recognised from his teams, although there is an attractive brand, which I think could be the reason why he was picked.

I think he’s on a hiding to nothing. He was announced 11 months before the season, every move was analysed from then on. Out of contract players (Hill and Mamo in particular) that the fans liked were being held against him when he was still the coach of another team. There is an expectation that he delivers and delivers now. He has said he is solely responsible for signings, he has shown that by clearing house of staff and bringing his own team, and some players that he knows and trusts. He’s been lauded as a great coup for the club, someone that’s going to put smiles back on the faces after a few years of being close but not good enough. But now, we aren’t a free flowing points machine, we’re paper thin defensively and have a coach complaining public about the squad after 6 rounds of SL.

If there’s not pressure on him, and pressure on the Chief Exec, then the club is in more trouble than we realise. The ambition must match the investment.

Stars??
Let's look at these boys.
How many of those lads do you think will play in the current England's starting team?
How good will England be anyway?
Other sides have signed useful non-English boys which we seem to have missed. Again I'm not saying we are rubbish ... but we are not packed full of the current stars of Super League as far as I can see.

Correct. None of those would get in the current England squad. Clark at a push but he’d be the only one.

I've read some nonsense on here before, but this is up there with the best of it

I mean 'he did ok' at Cas??

He literally had a side consistently punching above its weight for most of his tenure - Wasn't it a League Leaders's Shield, a GF final appearance & 2 Wembley visits?

His departure was definitely at the right time - He had undoubtedly hit his ceiling there & both he and Cas were in need of a fresh start, but to call his spell there 'ok' is a joke - Like describing Tony Smith's spell with us as not bad....

Powell simply needs time to get rid of the players that need moving on and bringing the right people in. You can't judge him in his first transitional year properly. Next year when he has the nucleus of the squad he wants to build will be the time to judge him properly.

This has been true for a number of years now and it is a product of mostly poor recruitment for a decade.

I've been saying this for a while and you would always get someone on here listing how many internationals we had in the starting line up or how many in our latest starting line up had come through our Academy as evidence of things going in the right direction, but really we were kidding ourselves. These guys were not as good as we made them out to be.

I don't think Price was the greatest coach in the world but in time his reputation may rise and people will say he did OK to get a Challenge Cup win and a few finals out of the squad he had.

Clearing out substandard/overrated players is part of the solution but it will only work if we bring the right players in, and on the track record of our recent recruitment I am not confident. We could get worse.

I do think Powell is a good coach though and should be kept around.

Widdop and Williams we’re England first choice players at the time of signing with us. The point of my post is that we’re not getting the best out of them.

Currie has played for England under consecutive coaches. Ratchford has been consistently picked by them. Cooper is, be common acceptance, our best forward.

The whole point is that they are under performing. If they were nobody's, they wouldn’t comment marquee or huge wages.

INOUT

In your assessment you are neglecting to mention £.

He had Castleford outperforming their cap limit and had a number of man of steel players whilst improving young players.

Anyway what are the options? We had 3 barren years with Price, another 1 wont hurt and give Powell the chance.

£ is one of the things that the board should have factored in though, as I’ve said. There’s little evidence that he can work with stars (debate on who the stars are aside), as Chase and Hardaker went off the rails and the others moved on quickly.

Paul Anderson has the same amount of trophies, and had success with a limited squad, but if he got the job we’d be scratching our heads in amazement.

My point is that the recruiting panel don’t seem to have a criteria for the post. The board have curated a squad of stars (at time of purchase) but haven’t got a leader who can get the best out of them. This isn’t a Powell bashing, this is that the direction from the executive isn’t clear.

To me, right now, it looks like the Cullen era when we had Monaghan, King, Anderson, Hicks etc and all the tools to compete but unfortunately the leader couldn’t squeeze the best out of them. And I love Paul Cullen, but the difference between Tony Smith and Paul Cullen is night and day.

If the board are maximising the cap, using the marquees and putting all of the available tools on the table for success, the coach must be a part of that plan, not just someone to hand out shirts. They need to knit the personalities, the EGO’s and the skills together to make a team.

I’m not saying Price is/was better (looks that way at the moment, his stock is rising with every poor week), but what I am saying is that we announced Price was leaving before a ball had been kicked, why rush and jump in to a decision unless it is the outstanding candidate.

I think many will share the comments on our recruitment strategy (if there is one). I would like to see us have a Director of Rugby who can have a longer term view on recruitment, retention, strategy, facilities, standards, sporting direction. Free up Karl to concentrate on marketing and non sporting operations.

Price should be remembered for the CC win balanced with the 3 limp out playoffs. He had 4 seasons. 3 seasons to apply a "quick fix" which he never did. Powell has come into a circus show of a club and playing squad and has had 10 games or so.

If we are still in this predicament in 12 months time and not showing progress then I will be calling for him to go. Until then I back him 100%.

It's more like the Cullen era when we had Reardon, Rauhihi, Sullivan, Vinnie Anderson, Swann. Players who were past their best or not as good as we thought.