Nothing is simple in rugby league, but I disagree with your timeline.

Fax have been taking the reserves seriously for around 3 years and look at how many of them are now playing in the first team. Still work in prioress but the club is getting the benefit of the investment in time and money.

Personal view is that all RL clubs should be mandated to run a reserve team. If not, good players just keep getting snapped up by SL clubs who don't want to bother to invest. A spiral of decline that removes a tier that players could use to benefit the overall game. I agree with a lot of what Bullseye says too.

From when I was a kid a long long time ago, Leigh was always a hotbed of rugby league and it still is. I am certain that you would have a lot of loyalty from local kids who would wear the badge with pride rather than go to another club.

You are and always will be a great rugby league club. All clubs will have their ups and downs but isn't that how things go.

We haven't had much continuity GUBRATS that's the point. Going into admin 3 times, lost our best youngsters 3 times. 3 different coaching set ups and heads of youth development. In 2017 we started from scratch with the only kids left ones nobody else wanted and they ended up in the first team. I take your point that the Bulls name probably still has a draw but there's more to it than just a name.

It does take time for it to bear fruit. Probably not as long as ten years though. More like 2-3 really. It's about setting achievable goals. It can be afforded in a part time environment. We do it. If you aim for having a 2-3 home grown players in your first team in 2-3 years time it'll be worth it. You'll begin to bring in layers of players with a real loyalty to Leigh rather than a bunch of mercenaries like you have had recently.

If we don't try to setup a reserves and academy, then we're 100% certain never to get any benefit from it.

Am sick of reading about how clubs on the doorstep means we can't do anything, if we're serious about being a community club, we should be doing our bit to get people in the town playing and give them a pathway in the sport.

Correct, removing our academy was probably not DBs biggest mistake but it was one of them. We had seen that academy start to bring lads through. They may not all be of SL standard but hey I’m sure we’d take a few of them back in a heartbeat.

Would rather have kept a few of them lads in the squad than loaning in lads from other SL clubs who would play 1 game or none...

I don't think a reserve or academy is in the interest of Leigh at present. They have moved from creating stability to a Club in survival again.

Reserves are not the answer. We had them. Now a different development plan with a gateway may help. That goes for the whole of the game. The sport is years behind in developing SL players, do you think simply starting a reserve side will sort all?

No it won't. The game needs a major change to bring it into reality. That could be a cost of Leigh, Widnes or even Leeds, the list is endless.

Get a plan in place and stick to it.. If the feeder club is the way then get on with it, before the game is ruined.

The game is already ruined the amateur game is dying a slow death it’s a shame cause if it carries on at this rate there will be no amateur game. I think the move to summer rugby killed it move back to winter and run an academy/A team in the summer along side the pro/semi pro clubs

Don't get me wrong , I'd prefer us to be much more active and supportive of RL within the community , be that localish amateur clubs or schools

However just having us take another couple of dozen players from the local U 16 s after Wigan,Wire and Saints have cherry picked the best isn't going to help them or us , quite often lads end up playing just 6/8 games a year as outside SL games are constantly called off due to numbers not being available

Yes it needs sorting but there's more to it than just Leigh setting up a team

Indeed Monty , more important than us ( Leigh Centurions ) getting the occasional local lad come through is having a well supported and thriving local amateur sport

The bit I have highlighted in bold?
I appreciate your enthusiasm but stability in the club is not one of our attributes, just look at the board index of this site in which clubs are placed, in the last 3 years in chronological order in the 8's system we have been in 8 catagories namely, Championship, Qualifiers, Championship, Qualifiers, Super League, Qualifiers, Championship, Sheild contenders, the club is as stable as a rowing boat in the middle of a stormy sea.

But that's just the nature of sport and of teams at the level of the ' gap ' , it's certainly more fun than the 6 years of decline stuck outside a licenced SL

What will the future hold ? Who knows ' great Innit ?

once the SL clubs have decided on he next structure then we can evaluate the next short term path to take

Now that's a sensible post,i agree.

It makes no difference Summer or Winter. What the community game requires is full support from the towns main club. But that has to work both ways in order for continuity to work.

I'm not simple and read many posts, of people involved with the amateur game including yourself in that. I can understand frustrations as someone with a goal in life forgot the ethos of the sport in order to find fame.

Not sure what bridges have been burnt with that claim to fame,but I know they need to be built again.

Of course going back to winter will help as in the summer it will free up players from amateur game to play for academy or A team without effecting the amateur game where you have to call games off as not enough players. Since amateur went to summer every club as struggled and it’s only getting worse if you look through the results you will see at least 12 games conceded a week

Its one factor for consideration, but thats not the full picture.