he's not an overseas player,following warrington for the last 35 years i think i'm a good enough judge to know who can do a job down here.

How long before we get this player?

In reference to this Tache. I have heard tonight that Huddersfield have shown in an interest in one of our players. Dont know if you have heard the same as you seem to be in the know. Dont want to mention any names on here or justify it as you seem to get cynical comments straight away.

If Smith rates Lowes then that should be the endorsement he needs to stay on, its better for Lowes whos still a novice coach that he does his apprenticeship under one of the best like Brian McDermott did.

The stuff about changing the backroom staff has been done to death before, remember how when Paul Darbyshire was here everybody used to say what did Darby do, we needed to get rid, needed to get a bigger name in who'd won things.

Since Darbyshire left to go to RU in Ireland our performances have dropped big time. I wonder whether he was the big burden that he was made out to be on this forum....

And Munster are the top team in Ireland...

Intriguing - serious question now, not trying to doubt you, but be honest - out of our signings over the past 3 or 4 seasons, how many did you instantly feel "good signing that, should do well" and how many did you think "he's not what we need, won't do a good job for us"?

As for new players, I understand that there may well be more departures before season end and some new faces too. Sorry that doesn't sound like solid info, but I offer it up all the same.

Why get new players? To improve the squad maybe.

If the kids are good enough they will get their chance. Would like to see McCarthy and Murphy get a chance, and Penny given an extended run on the wing.

Aside from that, who are these centres and halfbacks banging on the door of the first team?

to be honest i would say morley,king and rauhihi,all of them signing on the back of a couple of outstanding seasons.
obviously with the signing of johns you knew that you were getting a superstar,barring injury he would have signed permanently for us and today still keeps in close contact with the club.

sorry seb forgot to answer the last question,in the category of not what we needed i would put vinnie anderson in there as to be honest i have never seen just where he is best placed in our starting line up,he disappears too much during games for me.
stuart reardon was a very bad signing despite featuring for great britain,i personally have thought that he was at best average.
the reason i didn't welcome the above signings is that they both came from clubs who were successful at the time they were sold,successful clubs do not sell key playing staff on the whole,unless they are under financial pressure to do so.at the time of these signings neither bradford or saints were.

Darbyshire spent the latter part of his time here as conditioning coach, he was replaced by Stridgeon, who was an improvement in most people's eyes.

He was conditioning coach in his last season 2007. He was assistant coach before that which drew plenty of criticism on the forum, everyone said what does he do but put the cones out.....we needed someone who had won things. Remember how well Salford were doing in 2006 with Lowes and Hunte on their backroom staff, we needed someone like Lowes who had experience of winning trophies...

Also on the Stridgeon thing the only reason everyone was happy with that appointment was because he had been talked up so much, none of us who aren't in the camp had any idea of how good he was in comparison to his peers, we just heard that he'd been conditioner at Wasps RU and worked with Shaun Edwards and were assured that he was great. I'm not saying he wasn't, just that most comments about the conditioners, backroom staff etc are based on judgements from hearsay rather than being in a fair position to judge.

Nigel Halmshaw was much maligned when he came in because of the idea that he was Jimmy Lowes mate....I put to you that this year we have had a much lower injury list than we had in the past few seasons and perhaps if we had had Halmshaw conditioning the squad in the past few years then we would have had Johnson, Reardon, Bridge, Wood the Andersons fit every week and maybe if we'd had our first teamers available rather than having to play kids we could have won those trophies that were denied us by our injury list...?

I think you have raised a very good point. We should be buying players that have proved to shine at a club in a similar position to ourselves rather than go for the big name which may fade without the support of class players around them. We should have done better with the money that has been spent IMO.

I think Wakefield are a great example of this, bringing in players like Drew and Brough who are known to produce week in week out.

We shouldn't just buy players because they have won something. We should also get players that have proved to be good in weaker team

Fire wire, iwas just making the obsevation that we are a club in turmoil with certain playing staff not performing to there full potential, has for the half backs and centres not sure whos knocking on the door but the winger rhys looks handy and the new big stand off looks interesting. We have nothing to lose by intergrating a couple of players or even rotating them from the reserves to the first team, to see if any of these boys have the quality we are looking for. However in Smith we trust.