Looks like their wont be a choice in future if Elstone gets his way, personally I agree.
All those currently taking their £1.8M *as we did* without having an Academy/A Team set up will now be forced to dip into that pot to run one !

Must be an answer. Acadamies/Reserves..Where are all these players coming from?

The question was what do you want it to achieve ?

World domination .... World peace !
*Halifax & Bradford along with others are starting to bare fruit* even if many are poached by SL Clubs especially top 4 to 6*

Examples?

An academy is all well and good but we’re going to second picks for Miners East St Pats Jude’s. Even Westhoughton. Wire and Wigan will continue getting the best players for their established academies. Even though good talent comes out we aren’t an attractive prospect. As a full time SL club we would have been. Not for years now.

Nick Rawsthorne.

But, the quality of player pushing for 1st team has improved, DR has been very limited, team spirit never been higher. Top 4 achieved, not cost a fortune.
It's a reasonable route forward as a club

What do we want to achieve?

Lots of advantages to reserve grade. If you want to give your 19s a chance versus men but not risk them in first team or fob them off to another club it’s ideal. It maintains a pathway for late developers. Not every kid is ready for first team at 19. Keeps the whole squad match fit. Allows you to give trials to players without risking them in the first team. Allows coaching staff to influence all the players and monitor performance equally – impossible if players are farmed out to other clubs. Gives continuity to players that don’t get it if they’re dual reg at one club, then loan at another and brought back for the odd game then left out. In short if you want to develop your 19s better having a reserves is beneficial. More so than dual reg IMO. It also doesn’t devalue other competitions and shut out players at lower tier clubs.

As for academies. We run ours because it makes financial sense. If you have 5 or 6 lads coming in from the academy they cost less in salary than a fully formed player. They tend to have more loyalty to their parent club too. They’ve been our better performers than many we’ve brought in from outside. Young players can add plenty of enthusiasm to a side sometimes when it’s in a lull. It’s better for the game as a whole if you’re developing youth players.

Bullseye , I commend your clubs continuing funding and running academy and reserve , but it is a continuance of your SL era , one where you were the biggest draw to the best juniors , that continuity makes a massive difference , we however would be again starting from scratch , IMO it would take 6/7 to 10 years before we would see a single player of quality , so going off mr Briers maths that's half a million quid before we see a tangible return

It isn't that simple

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.