I'm a bit "tenth bitten twice shy" with our prop recruitment. Partly driven by the fact I can't comment on Butler and I haven't seen enough of Mulhearn this year. They're recruiting in the right place at least, whether Butler is a Hill or an England, we'll see in a few months, I'm hopeful for him though, as I was hopeful for Tasi, Cox, Sita, Roy, Dodds et al.

I get what you're saying and the new lineup may not be perfect but an England is an upgrade on a Latu, surely. I would also say an upgrade on a sita given the ability to play (or be trusted to play) for longer than 10 minutes.

We will have to see, I'm glad we are trying to bulk up the pack depth anyway and I'm also glad it's UK based players who I think will be hungry to prove they have the credentials to belong at a team expected to challenge in all competitions.

It will have to be good enough, unless we offload Sita and or Latu we will have:

Hill
Cooper
Philbin
Mulhern (if it comes off)
Butler

Sita
Kibula
Latu

With the likes of Clark, Doro and possibly Hughes (depending on if we sign a new back rower) who could class themselves as 'middles' (hate that term).

We have too much of our salary cap already in the prop department because of poor recruitment.

All depends on how Mulhern and Butler turnout, Hill, Cooper & Philbin are more than good enough, but we need two more pros to step up to become that 4th prop option in the 17.

When we let Chris Hicks go to accommodate Monaghan Jnr, I seem to recall that we paid him off in the offseason so the payment didn’t count towards the Salary Cap, is that still the rule (and if so would the club consider it for Latu?).

As far as I know yes, as long as a player doesn’t play in the season, you could pay them off with no cap impact. Would still cost us to pay off the contract obviously and I’m not sure what happens if we pay ‘some’ of his salary to facilitate a move to another club, does the amount we part pay count, or does none count as he isn’t our player?

Just increases salary cost at a time I’m sure we are trying to cost save.

I’m sorry. I just assumed based on what some other posters have said that we had a bottomless money pit (it’s just to the right of the money tree if you’re trying to locate it).

So 2 props acquired, on the face of it both good signings. I can’t see any obvious criticism of these signings, They are not from Australia so no issues re families (although Yorkshire based players have been known to struggle), they can hardly be accused of being here for a holiday/pension top up. Mulhern seems a steady Eddie with potential to step up and Butler a bit of a young gun. Hardly “Hollywood “ signings but is that important.
We as supporters have spotted the weakness in the prop department, so have the club and they have worked to fill it. Are they due some praise? Is this a flurry of signings? My natural optimism is starting to reassert itself, throw the cold water my way.

No praise yet. They've signed massive amounts of props over the past 4-5 years. It's not a tick box exercise, it's about the quality. As said, Butler could be a Hill or could be an England. Crosby was v decent at Wigan and obviously had devastating personal issues that turned him into half the player for us. The list of failed props at our club is lengthy.

Optimistic and excited to see them, absolutely, but based on track record, I wont be praising the recruitment until it's shown to be successful, else it's just clapping for the sake of it.

Cold enough?

take crosby's family issues aside, his body was done, he's said in his retirement statement he's had injuries that hampered him from the time he signed for warrington, even before the family issue he was missing for a number of weeks. due to niggling injuries.

Also, as an aside, have you got your quotes turned off in your settings, it never loads in properly for some weird reason, looks odd.

It’s more by way of an experiment. We can all look at a signing and with HINDSIGHT say he was rubbish, it was obvious he was going to be rubbish etc etc.
What I m asking is if you see something wrong in these 2 signings say it now, rather than after the event. The club don’t have a crystal ball anymore than we do but if a fan can identify a weakness in a signing in advance and the club didn’t then criticism is warranted (as it undoubtedly was in Latu’s case).
This isn’t aimed at you by the way, just a general comment.

So now we’re stuffed to the gunnels with Props, what’s our tactics going to be?

I reckon it’s looking like 5 drives and a kick for next season

Happy days

Any better?

I guess Butler has it all to prove and could be a dud and Mulhern comes with a decent reputation. So a bit of foresight.....Butler is a risk and wouldn't have appeased me in isolation but as I said earlier, thankfully they also have Mulhern so Butler doesn't get the pressure of being "the answer" and we get a proven SL prop...... I'm optimistic with these 2.

I guess approach is right, whether the asset is right should now be down to the coaching staff, especially with Mulhern

We wanted props, they signed props. You criticise the signing of props. Other than relegation what do you want?
(You are a Widnes fan and I claim my fiver).

If Mulhern is such a good quality prop, why have HKR let him go ? In fact, surely they should have received a fee from Wire as well as Johnson ? Why has he only had one game for the Knights back in 2018 ? So the verdict is out for me. There could be a reason for his release if HKR were paying a too high salary and needed to trim down due to the ravages of Covid on their budgets, but that is the only one I can think of.

With few decent props around, few are likely to be happy sitting on the bench or even waiting in the squad for a game, so we are certainly much better off than last season in that respect. But I think we are looking at two bench props here, brought in to give Hill and Coops a rest and with the hope that Mulhern can be restored to his former glory whilst Butler kicks on and develops into a first team pick.

I think the reality is probably that Mulhern was not producing the goods at HKR and neither was Johnson at Wire. So this was a clever swap whereby both parties could try their hand at getting more from the players.

you'd get disheartened playing in a team that keeps going through massive squad upheaval, nothing seems to getting any better, no chance of getting near a final, never mind winning.

We come a-calling, do you let him go and get something in return, or refuse and let him become disgruntled, eventually letting him go a few weeks later when the situation has soured and relationships have broken down.

The interesting thing here is that KR (for all the impressive performances he did last year on loan) have only given johnson a 12 month contract,

Surely the addition of

at the end of every single post he makes clarifies everything he writes is a joke.

Oh...yes...of course. Always the sign of a shining wit (credit to Dr Spooner).

Lol, I stated a fact, you took it as criticism ,



But what do you really want?, and how far might you be prepared to go to achieve it.

A bit like your playing namesake

Hull KR wouldn't of demanded a fee for Mulhern as we would have demanded a fee for Johnson as they were both contracted to 2021. Mulhern was good for KR last year, it's this year he's stagnated but it's been a year all round and Apart from 3-4 players for KR none of them have really been good.
He also played twice for England knights in 2018 and played a game for the full England squad against France and prior to that has 4 caps for Ireland.
He might have stagnated abit but i'm not worried about that at all, as i believe he will get back his form with the like of Hill and Cooper around him. And Butler took his place in the england knights squad in 2019.
I'm very happy with these 2 signing with us and i'm not gonna pretend i'm not, Butler is the next hill for me but more aggressive and faster and he's a big lad, 6'2 and 17st i'm happy with that. And Mulhern is a great addition.
Johnson isn't cut out to be a prop and he's been here 3 years and virtually got no game time so moving him on to sign a young out and out Prop in Mulhern who is a proven Super league prop is good business on our side.
I've not been this happy with our forwards in about 5-6 years, now if we can sort the halfback issue out i'm excited and confident for next year with the sqaud we have.

Actually you gave your OPINION about the likely playing style.

Your original comment referenced Props, do make your mind up

I would agree about Butler. His aggression and the fact that he " wen't away and worked on exactly the areas he needed to improve" whilst at London, plus his age ( 22) make him a really interesting prospect for us. But despite the fact that props seem to mature rather later in their careers, Mulhern is already 26 and I have a feeling he will turn out to be another Anthony England. I would love to be proved wrong of course.