. This isn't football where money buys success, it is an organic thing that teams have to work hard for'"

I suppose 'decline' all depends on how you view it, for example you say that the fact that we have allowed other teams to catch up with us as we haven't kept our high standard of players IS evidence of decline, whereas I say that the fact we are still challenging for honours (possibly not the season though!) is good evidence that we are NOT in decline -it's a fact that we have made every GF since 2006 and from the top of my head possibly every semi final in the challenge cup since then - so it's a matter of how you view the situation.

McManus has quite cleverly (IMO anyway) took all the pressure and sting out of the next three fixtures as the fans will realise that we have nothing to lose going into them. If Royce was still in charge then the amount of pressure that the players would be under would be immense and lead to even more misery if we failed to perform: now the players can refocus without the added pressure.

Whether that's a good tactic is unclear and I'm sure we'll find out Sunday.

I don't think the worst is over, but I don't think it could/can get any worse!

If Eastmond and/or Pryce were at Saints this year then Royce Simmons would have still been in a job at Saints.

The recruitment policy by Siants over the last couple of seasons has been poor. To an extent it is a consequence of believeing their own over-hyping of the ability of Gaskell and Lomax at this stage of their careers. People were calling for these two to be England's four nation half-backs yet now they can't hack it together at Super League level.

come on london

It was impossible to keep Eastmond (maybe it wouldn't have been had we been allowed a similar dispensation as Wigan were re. Tomkins), and Pryce wanted a longer, more lucrative deal than we were prepared to offer given he'd sat a season out injured and the extent of his recovery was something of an unknown.



The signing of Hohaiah wasn't one which I'd have gone for, but he was an established and high profile NZ international, so it's hard to be too critical of it and it is very early in his Saints career to write him off.

It wasn't just Saints fans rating Gaskell and Lomax. They were highly rated because they were performing well. This might be 'second season syndrome', or it might be that their confidence is sapped playing behind a beaten pack in a team that has been sent out with apparently little to no game plan / set plays to work from.

This Saints team, pre season, were widely tipped to be Warrington's closest challengers for top spot. That is in the knowledge that Pryce and Eastmond are no longer here, and in the knowledge that Graham has left a huge hole.

That they haven't looked close to top 4 material thus far, despite having a squad that was judged by many to be top 2, has to be down to the manner in which they have been prepared for games.

All this 'weak squad, poor recruitment' stuff has only really appeared after our awful start. There weren't many declaring this before the season kicked off.

Maybe it's just me but I think the decline of Saints has been grossly overstated. Any side losing some of their greatest players ever (Sculthorpe, Long, Cunningham, Pryce, Graham) will always take a long time to get back to those lofty heights; however, at the same time, people can't knock consistently competing at the highest level.

Take the football as an example: this season United could end up winning nothing, Liverpool will end the season with at least one trophy. Will we get Liverpool fans talking about United declining? About how their fans are measuring success incorrectly because they now measure competing as being successful, instead of actually winning? I doubt it, because most Liverpool fans know United have been the second best side in Europe over the past five years and they've been the best side in England over the past five years.

For me, in a sport like RL where a salary cap exists, for a side like St Helens to consistently reach finals and the latter stages of a competition, shows immense consistency and great quality. They may well have struggled in the GF over the years, but I'd rather be declining and competing in GFs than being 'the benchmark' and not playing in the apparent only game that matters.

This season, I haven't seen enough of them to say how bad they've become, but I imagine things will turn around for them eventually, the year is early and I still remember our start under Lowes being turned around into a Challenge Cup win. A side like Saints, however much we like to 'bait' them, shouldn't be ruled out so early.

No bud I went to birchwood, left in 2000

Nathan Brown has signed a 3 year deal at Saints apparently for 2013 onwards.