Do you think he would get in the Saints or Wigan pack? I don't and that should be our benchmark for establishing parity with our peers.

I've said it before about Akuola, I'd happily trade the two blockbusting crowd pleasing runs a game we get for 40 mins of hard yards, and/or offloads.

Saints don't rely on showy runs from the likes of Knowles, Taia and Ashworth they get hard grunt, offloads and big minutes.

Akuola is a ahow pony - he ia the exact opposite of what we need, and if the coach feels he can't do big minutes then he needs flogging for giving him a.new contract.

By all accounts BMM has been 'managing' injuries for most of his time here. I agree he can do the minutes and if he can get himself right he is more than capable of doing 60 minutes for us in the back row. He would be a great asset there and I would start him with Currie. Big season for BMM contract wise - needs to prove he can do a job for 60 minutes, as at the minute we're not seeing enough value from him - despite his undoubted ability.

I disagree about Sita not looking 'gassed' after his stints, he seemed to really struggle after that initial 15 - 20 minute period, and you could see it in his defensive work.

Philbin's minutes have been creeping up as he has proven himself capable of maintaining his performance over a longer period - the coaching staff clearly don't feel that is the case for Sita and feel the injuries that BMM have been carrying are impacting his quality on the field too. There will be plenty of analysis on how each player performs over time during the game, I'm sure that's used to determine how long a player should play on for before his performance levels drop too low.

Yes and Yes from a bench spot.

BMM can do longer minutes when he is fit he clearly was not fit for most of the season, and didn't seem to trust his leg himself judging by warm ups.

Who would he replace from the Saints pack?

Matty Lees for one.

I hope that is only because youre referring to Matty Lees' long term injury? If you are basing it on ability then what few marbles you had left have definitely rolled off into traffic.

(Duck whistles)

I think these decisions are not just down to the coach. We were not happy with the recruitment for a number of years at the end of the TS era either.

duckie's benchmark for Jason Clark was 'if he was that good, Souths wouldn't have released him'

Surely the same applies with Sita - if he was that good why did he get released by Penrith?

So we have

Fitzpatrick - CEO
Middleton - Chairman
Broomhead - Vice Chairman
Lomax - Director
Summers - Director
Moran - Majority shareholder
James - Director
Price - Head Coach
Briers - Assistant Coach
Henderson - Assistant Coach
Leuluai - Head of Rugby Operations


I can no longer find out who is responsible for youth development, recruitment and retention.

Surely it is ultimately the responsibility of the CEO even if others are directly responsible - they answer to him.

But the recruitment problems went further back than Fitzpatrick being appointed.

Isn't Paul Anderson running the youth set up or whatever they call it now ?

Thought it was the guy they brought in from cas. Is it Pete riding?