To be honest I've not seen him play for many years, but have seen Widdop play.
Given their respective ages I'd have thought Widdop would be a great signing with a long career left. Gidley will hopefully be up there but has less years left.
I see Ratch as fb and so that would supposedly mean Gidley in the halves.
To play at the level he has - he's unlikely to loose quality (maybe a bit of speed), so hopefully whoever partners him can learn.

What on earth will happen to Chris Bridge then?

I want the best player available for the best position. It's feck to do with Chris Bridge, it's about Ratchford and Bridge who are or were imo the best hb partnership available in this current squad.

It may of passed your mind were talking about 2016?

Backtracking at its finest.

Totally consistent...

Best hb paring we have currently had in this squad post Briers. Unbeaten as 6 & 7.

That however doesn't mean I'm not open to other combos so long as they are as effective. The problem is they hadn't been.
I'm hoping that Patton and Myler are and more so.

If true, I'm not over enthused by this signing.
He's been playing at FB which we have Ratch for.
He hasn't been playing HB for a while now and its a HB we desperately need.

Who was the Aussie PC signed to play HB for us around the 05/06 season and within a few games it was obvious he wasn't a HB, he eventually played hooker and broke his arm. I don't want history to repeat itself.

Come on Irish, as it's not been officially confirmed he is signing for us, then people can at least have an opinion about what they make of the rumours. Me personally, I'm a bit underwhelmed by it, mainly because of his age, but if he does sign with us, then I'll certainly give him a chance to show what he can do.

I'm assuming if this signing does go through, then Agent K will be taking his neuralyzer to all the Wire fans and erasing any memories of us going in for Cooper Cronk....

He has also gone onto the VT saying he's signed for us.

Strange, I've not heard anything from Tony Smith or the club about that, unless our 2016 recruitment has been offshored to the Daily Telegraph in Australia.

Michael Sullivan. Those were the days.

Won't go down in the annuls as one of Wire's greatest signings......

Until The Mole puts his name to this, I will treat it as the speculative punt that it is.

totally agree ratch and bridge were our best hb pairing results prove that any one dis- agreeing are just being stupid...atm tho myler and patten are making a very good fist of it so leave them there and just hope and prey that patten doesnt get injured or its back to obrien and myler and that does not clearly work...for next season who knows who our hb will be it could be gidley cronk maloney and i heard off a super league player kyle eastmonde will be here next season

It is coming from Barry Toohey.
Without going too much into grubby politics involving Nathan Tinkler etc, a few years ago the Knights decided not to deal with the local newspaper and Made the Sydney Telegraph their official news outlet, and now funnel all rumours and "scoops" through the Newcastle based Telegraph journalist Barry Toohey.
He gets info straight from Matt Gidley and writes a weekly article that isn't available online and just appears in a special Newcastle Supliment of the Sunday Telegraph, and I have to admit it's the only reason I buy the Murdoch rag at all.
Anyway, what that means is that Toohey is the guy for Knights news and is very rarely wrong.

Maybe a good signing for you on what Roopy has said.
You have some decent young guys coming through and Gidley may just be that senior pro who appears to have a great work ethic that will help these guys develop into first class regulars.
Slightly off subject Ratchford for me would make a great 13. He's tough and a natural. Maybe Gidley at FB would enable him to move to 13?

I know Harrision has the 13 shirt this year but you don't seem to have a settled man for loose forward. Perhaps Gidley will go to 13, Patton & Myler half backs, with Ratchford at 1.
With two good 9s that does seem a very good spine with a mixture of youth and experience.