The reason Wane can do that is because Wigan produce enough good players that they can field a side with a lot of young players and they can still hold their own in SL with good sides. We don't produce enough good players so we can't do that - if we fielded sides packed with our Academy players in SL in order to give them experience they would get hammered.

Remember what the reaction was like on here, when TS rested senior players a few times back in the days of the top 8 playoffs, and stuck young lads in the squad instead, people were saying "if the club can't be bothered taking this league game seriously then why should the fans bother turning up?" and saying what a mockery it was that we had 6 months of meaningless games before the playoffs.

I think basically it is difficult. RFU's aim was totally unrealistic. Heads of schools and PE Teachers still have freedom as to which sports are taught in their school. Grabbing a top bloke from another area and splashing a bit of limited cash is not guaranteed to produce results. Lots must have looked at Wigan and tried to replicate how they produce rugby players but it ain't just about "if the intent is there". Mind you you've got to try.

Lets hope that this guy can actually spot junior talent without you having to pay top dollar to poach them from other SL clubs?

That’s sounding a little bitter there Chin... last year we only had two overseas players, plenty of our own academy and a few big names ‘bought in’...

How many other clubs had such a home-grown core in the last few years? Didn’t do us any good, all we won was a league leaders shield. Now we are restructuring the club from the bottom up and it’s looking promising. In the meantime while we wait for that to bear fruit, we’ll spend what we need to in order to chase success. Fortunately we can afford to, and that’s not something I’m going to feel embarrassed about.

With the occasional gem, we will always be in a position of weakness when we rely on signing young players that are rejected by their own club for not being good enough.

This is not the case at all.
I've already posted about Warrington paying latge contract fees for young talent. Wire arnt after anyone's cast offs. TS made some bizarre signings when he had unquestioned control over ins and outs, but that era has gone. The board has a grip.

In the later TS years we seem to have a larger group of home-grown players being involved with the first team than for a long time. But I wouldn't describe it as a home-grown core. Currie, Cooper and Patton are in the core, then there are a lot of others who come in and out of the side but haven't established themselves as anything more than fringe players in SL.

I don't think this increase in home-grown players being involved is due to the quality of products from our Academy increasing, its been because the quality of our recruitment generally has declined so it's become easier to get in our team.

It's the reverse of what happened in the Cullen era. The early Cullen era, around the time we left Wilderspool was the last time we had a strong home-grown presence in the core of the team: Lee Penny, Sibbitt, Hilton, Wood, Wainwright, Noone, Mark Gleeson, Hulse and Stevens were all regulars in the 17.

By the time Cullen left, it was down to Riley, Wood, Cooper, Pickersgill and Mark Gleeson, but the quality of players brought in from outside had increased a lot.

Pickersgill and Mark Gleeson then left and in the early successful days of the TS era, we were down to Wood, Riley and Cooper plus a few around the fringes like McCarthy, Williams, Evans and GO'B. Towards the end of the TS era there was an increase in the numbers of home-grown players being involved around the fringes but still only a few in the core 17.

Sorry, I should have used a different term, as I actually meant ‘Home Grown’ as in ‘UK-reared’. It was a response to an increasing trend of fans of other clubs claiming we rely on buying in young players, when their own clubs in fact rely on overseas players rather than their own products or Super League stock.

But yes, we haven’t really had a ‘core’ of Warrington academy players for a while, despite what seemed like a good bunch of talented youngsters from both local teams and as far afield as Wales and France. I think we put too much responsibility in the hands of one man, when we should looked at what works for other clubs with a proven track record for getting the young players to transition successfully. I don’t believe it’s purely down to the talent spotting, as you only need to watch early videos of the likes of the Evans Brothers to see what potential existed in the academy.

Be interesting to see if Rhys Evans & Brad Dwyer can regain their early promise under a different coach.

Hughes was an exact example of this. Tony has only been gone 3 months.

i think that dwyer will be a great fit for us at the rhinos as their is a great player in there that was stifled whilst at warrington under tony smith

As I recall he was on loan at Huddersfield and his contract was to expire. Huddersfield offered him a deal and he chose Warrington.

You could argue he wasn't in Wanes plans but he was in Huddersfield and he certainly has furthered his career beyond that of a rejected youngster.