Quote: Ste100Centurions "Correct me if I am wrong but, doesn't Leigh as a town have 2 of the most successful amateur RL Clubs of recent times in Miners & East.
Seemingly most years I am reading about how highly one or the other/often both have finished or that they have won a comp outright. Of course there are other clubs of note in other areas who are always there or thereabouts such as Hull Dockers, Thato Heath etc, but even the Wigan clubs can't hold a candle to our two over recent times.
How is it then that Saints can see something in Leigh ARL players that we don't ?
Do LCRLFC have scouts watching ARL & our local teams in particular & does it have a proper scouting system in place ? Do we look further afield at other areas in ARL ? Who is/are our scouts ?
Not really having a dig at the Club, more that as a fan with no connections inside the Club it is hard to know what if anything the Club are doing in this area.
It would be nice to think that we are planning for the future without just chasing Aussies or released SL players etc.
Recruitment, Rangi Chase aside has been very good, but we are buying in, economically & for the good of British RL, only importing, either from overseas or other SL Clubs is not IMHO the way forward, Leeds must be the model, Bradford to as a Championship example.
I know it's early days & that we must first consolidate our position in SL but long term, academy RL is the road to success.
Just my opinion.'"
Its quite difficult as most U16 players will want to join a category 1 (academy) club. The benefit of being a category 1 club is they get to keep those players all season, which means that they cannot go to any other club.
As Salford where downgraded to category 2,U16's would only get to play a maximum of six games per season,usually January/February and then return to their amateur clubs.
So straight away you have to ask the question? Where is the clear pathway to U19's and First team levels being a category 2 club?
