If you look at what Tony Rea started with, you could loosely break down the squad into four segments.

(Anyone noted in red has been released by Rea; anyone in green has been signed by him and the rest were awarded their last contract by Powell or Mac)

PLAYERS OF SUPER LEAGUE STANDARD, WITH A GOOD FITNESS TRACK-RECORD OVER THEIR CAREER
Dorn, Dixon, Channing, Melling, Witt, Kaufusi, Bryant, Bailey, Clubb, Wheeldon, Lee, Cook, Fisher, Lovell, Rinaldi., Gower,

PLAYERS OF SUPER LEAGUE STANDARD, BUT LIKELY TO PLAY ONLY 1 in 2 GAMES
Colbon, Rodney, Robertson, Sarginson, Temata, Golden

PLAYERS WHO WOULD NOT BE A REGULAR STARTER IN A TOP 10 SUPER LEAGUE TEAM
Grady, Krasniqi, O'Callaghan, McMeeken, Hurst, Mendieka, Dollapi, R Thomas, Bryan, Caro, Edwards, Bolger, Bolger, Ridley

PLAYERS WHOSE BEST PERFORMANCES WERE MANY YEARS AGO BUT STILL ON LARGE SALARIES
Randall, Howell

In the group of players of Super League standard, it is important to remember that almost all the regularly fit players on the list were signed from Academies/Reserves or from a club who featured regularly in the bottom 3. The ones with a less consistent track record were signed from bigger clubs, but are available less often, and a factor in them becoming available on the market was their injury records.

The other two lists are full of players who are yet to prove they are regular Super League players or have proven they are not.

I don't know what anyone could do with this squad, be it Wayne Bennett or Rob Powell, for there are lots of liabilities and few assets, but Tony is pruning out when he can.

The fact is that Tony is prepared to get his hands dirty and clear out the dead wood when previous managers would auto renew year after year even when players didn't deserve a new deal or had poor fitness records.

David Hughes has seemingly given out the Head Coach job without a rigourous process on more than one occasion so he can be questioned. The real issue is that a 30 year old Youth Coach was given the salary cap to spend and he was taken for a ride.

Tony will need 18 months to reverse this damage, it is frustrating, but he is clearing out the dead wood when given the chance. We will improve in each of the next two years, I am sure that will happen.

I know there are a lot of nay sayers who take each defeat as another nail in the coffin, but I am sure they are wrong.

There is no chance of a 12 team Super League if the clubs are given a vote - none at all. The likes of Salford, Wakefield, Castleford and London will not vote for it, nor will anyone else in real jeapordy of missing out and the clubs will not want less revenue. The RFL will bottle out from just making changes without consulatation too.

The facts are that there are no credible replacements for London in Super League - we will not be replaced to add in yet another small part of Yorkshire, Lancashire or a second French team and the RFL have buggered up Wales.

So we need to be proportionate, ed off but proportionate.

I agree with much of what you say but I'll quibble about development work. There was more development work in London when Broncos started up than in Gateshead when they began. The RLC hadn't started but there was a London League; for Gateshead there was basically nothing.

My first reply disappeared into the ether so this one will be short.

Clearly London are not a heartlands side and yes you've been in a difficult situation most of your existence. But I think rules have to be considered on a merit basis rather than "If Catalans / Crusaders / Gateshead had this right then we should have it too".

There are no championship clubs on your doorstep but there are three in championship 1. There are lots of good youngsters in the area but the club don't have the finances to keep them. I agree that London is a special case with respect to the salary cap but I don't think an extension would help you keep those players - the club has rarely been able to spend the full salary cap.

I think the days when semi-decent Australasian players would come over here are over. With or without an extension, you won't be able to recruit origin players but tbf I don't think the northern clubs can either.

If the half decent overseas players aren't coming any more due to the NRL salary cap rise and the best local juniors are being picked up by other clubs/union then it leaves London with the scraps which is clearly unsustainable.

It seems to me that there are four options:

1. If the owner can afford it allow a London weighting to the salary cap in order to keep homegrown players and compete for others.
2. If the money isn't there relax the overseas quota to allow a bit more leeway for overseas signings (such as they are) but this is less likely to have much effect.
3.Get some sort of finance from elsewhere RFL/SKY/SL/A new backer. Can't see much chance of this happening.
4. Do nothing and see club go to the wall or come back as a national league team like Skolars and lose a top flight club in the capital.

I suspect the problem comes down to money. If the owner can't or won't invest what's needed to keep/recruit a better squad and to properly market the club then you're doomed to limp on until it goes tits up. Having been in this situation at the Bulls I know what a pi55er it is.

Get the RFL or SKY to help - what a joke. The RFL refused to grant us London Weighting which would have been fairer to the salary caps and the amount if costs to live in LONDON. SKY are an even bigger joke, how can you say we have a fair playing field with them, we have been on SKY once this season plus the magic weekend. Teams up north get a massive amount of free advertising their games are always on TV and advertised as the game next weekend is leeds v wigan etc. We are never on there, we get no free advertising because of this and it certianly doesnt help to let people know we are around when we never get mentioned. Some would say it is a blessing in disguise this season but this is every season with the RFL and SKY it is not a one off. Fair play with these two outlets is a joke. We are on our own always have been and I cannot see it changing. I wish outsiders would see and relaise LONDON get no free rides from anyone.

Yes, there seems still to be general acceptance that we're in SL because Sky insisted on it. Well, that may have been the case in the early days but it obviously isn't now. They do their little features about London's quirkinesses - Two Albanians and such like but there's never any analysis of our situation.

Plenty of injuries to some of our higher-profile (albeit not very effective) imports but seldom mentioned. Everybody was repeatedly told that Saints were missing 8 or 9 first choice players when we beat them, but we were missing an almost unmentioned half a dozen or so, on top which, three of Saints absentees were self-inflicted due to suspensions. Grrrr ... Rant over, but I think it shows that there's no special Sky interest in London now, if there were, the commentators would be directed to lay it on about our difficulties.