The salary cap was brought in to stop teams over spending and going bust not to even up the league.

Spot on.
We're obsessed with chequebook signings.

To be fair, the club DO give chances to the youngsters, but, if they don't "hit the ground running", they tend to be jettisoned. I've said for years, academy lads who are progressing, must be crestfallen when we sign yet another NRL player, solely to fill quota spots.

How many of our underused academy players have been released by the club and gone onto being what you would class as good SL players, Lefty?... I don't see any instances where we have released any and had any regrets from what they then achieved after leaving?

I think it's more to do with us not signing the quality youngsters, rather than them not getting a chance?

Since the last Saints V Leeds final, the following teams have been in a Grand Final:

Saints, Leeds, Wigan, Wires, Cas, Salford, Catalan.

In addition to that, the following teams have won the LLS:

Saints, Leeds, Wires, Huddersfield, Catalan.

The following have won the Challenge Cup:

Saints, Leeds, Wigan, Wires, Hull, Catalan.

The following have contested the Challenge Cup final:

Salford, Cas, Hull KR, Huddersfield.

We've also seen Hull in the Grand Final in the past, and obviously Bradford's period of success all since the GF era started in 1998.

The last six Grand Finals have had six different runners up too!

There is absolutely no issue whatsoever with the "same old teams in the Grand Final". The issue solely lies with the same old teams WINNING the Grand Final. It's the job of the wide range of "close but no cigar" teams to find a way of changing that, and no club is more culpable of failing to do that than us.

Where they move to is one point and a very valid one at that, but it's not the only factor. If you've got lads who have been together for 10-15 years, there's a culture and a pride there to wear the shirt. There's countless Wigan players who have left that system after winning silverware and go on to do nothing. Case in point, Partington, him and smithies were 18 I think and bullied our pack a few years ago, he's now off to Salford.

Yes they have to be at a level, but the psychology of playing with your "brothers" is different to that if playing with some 31 year old kiwi.

Slightly rhetorical question but, has the current pack performed better than a pack that could've had Cooper, Philbin, G.King, Livett & Currie.

Is Bullock ripping up the trees that King wasn't and is Livett a poor mans Olli holmes?

Has Roberts, Austin, Sandow, Widdop, Williams done better than Gaz O'B would've done alongside either one if them?

It's all hindsight this, I do get that. But i don't think Mr C Sandow gave two flying eroos about Warrington, whereas, maybe, because he came through the system, G O'b would, stood next to lads he's grown up with

Well I would rather have Cooper here next season, who actually understands the P&B, than some big name Aussie on an executive salary who is only here to top up his pension and will be homesick the moment there's a spot of rain.

#KissKamOut then?

Re youth and catchment.

If you were a top young prospect from Burtonwood, Penketh, Leigh or wherever and had opportunities at Saints, Wigan and Warrington presented to you - would you choose Warrington?

Back on the point of the Grand Final, why do Wire fans call Saints the "bottlers"?

You could argue that we have "bottled it" in big games almost as much or even more than Saints have.

It's going to get even harder for us to attract the best local talent now. Leeds have appointed Peter farrell as their first nw based talent scout. We have definitely taken some big steps forward with the academy but we need to keep going. Our academy competing with the big 3s academy is absolutely key to competing with them at first team level their academies mean they have much deeper squads than every other team.

In 27 years ONLY 4 teams have won super league .

As of 2022 -

St Helens (10),
Leeds Rhinos (icon_cool.gif,
Wigan Warriors (5),
Bradford Bulls (4).

I'd obviously like that stat to be five with us joining the list BUT is it in itself such a poor ratio?

It's comparable with the Premier League with ONLY seven winners in a similar time frame with many more teams going after top spot and that includes one off's Blackburn and Leicester.

I think our problem isn't that we have so few winners It’s more the quality of the product on the pitch across the board is the issue.

Our fan fan base is stagnant media interest is hit and miss at best and the sport is reliant the same punters to support a number of events.

I didn't attend yesterday first I've missed for a dozen years but would a Salford Huddersfield final garnered any more interest? I’m not so sure

I quite like the idea of this Band of Brothers routine and yes having a strong academy with a good hit rate of producing SL standard players from within with P&B coursing through their veins is worth striving for.

However. using hindsight and revisit our 2012 squad and tell me about all those players that couldn't give a monkeys.

That's the balance of squad I’d like to see here now and I didn't think any less or more of a player based on where they were from.

Effort and giving all for the cause and your team mates comes from within surely

In that same period, 12 different teams have won the NRL and that might become 13 next week.