Yes, good coaches are available now, if we wait they will be snapped up!

I doubt he is, considering the business he's in and the money he's made. More realistically he knows Powell had the weakest side in the league to work with and we got results to match.

I've noticed that Clubb isn't getting as much stick this season, although that's not really downt to him, it's because he's been less exposed by the second-row inside him which was the cause most of the stick he got last season.

I'm charitable, I would prefer it if Powell didn't have the weakest squad in the league, were more than half the squad are cast-offs, well past their best, kids, or not really SL class anyway. In the last 5 years we've lost players of the calibre of McLinden, Hill, Paul, Leuluai, Hopkins and even Orr and LMS, in the last 2 years a few of our better forwards have been injury prone i.e. Purdham, Temata and Golden. It's a rag bag side.

Do you know any clubs who have announced anything yet, do you know any more that any of us what may be going on! as I said I doubt Noble would come to London, Harris is supposed to be heading for Wigan as assistant, no one really knows, what is Morgan and Matterson doing? no one knows and Hull deny Agar! so I am not really into any panic yet!

Powell chose to recruit Nick Kouparitsas, Jack Latus, Mark Calderwood and Chris Bailey for 2011.

He chose to play Randall out-of-position for months and then offer this declining player a two year contract.

He allowed our two best forwards Oliver Wilkes and Andy Ellis to go to Wakefield and has effectively swapped them for Michael Korkidas and Julien Rinaldi.

He has only attracted average players from within Super League other than those whom have lost their jobs - players like Liam Colbon. No one decent would choose to sign for him.

He plays guys like Calderwood and Pryce when we have better juniors like Caro and Dixon.

He need to go, he is shocking.

Excellent post, Couldn't agree more.
Time for change now.

Not ready for a first grade head coaches role... He is there simply because the funds were going to spent attracting a decent first grade coach.

Hopefully for 2012 he is able to go back to an assistants position.

At the same time, his squad is very ordinary and it dint appear he had the funds to go out and procure quality players.

Are these confirmed?

I am charitable and he has the weakest squad in the league, BUT we need a wheeler dealer to get some better players in and i am not sure he can do it. Also worry about the bigger names coming in - Witt/Gower, will they have anything to do with him?

Powell did a certain amount of inheriting - it's not clear to me that all recruitment was done *after* Powell began as acting head coach. In any case, he had the smallest budget in SL so signings are inevitably hit-and-miss - admittedly Koups was a disaster, but Bailey is a good player.

Same goes for UK players - we're not in the market for stars, we have to sign cast-offs. Players sign for money+potential success. We can't offer the latter, we struggle with the former.

On Randall. The squad hasn't had a no. 7 for years - again not sure if Powell had time to fix this pre-season. In any case, with Randall at 7, the team won games so not a disaster.

Latus/Calderwood were on trial which was hardly an outrageous option. Not sure why Calderwood has been persisted with but swapping him for Caro/Dixon is peripheral to what the team has/would have achieved in 2011.

Now, all that said, I think Powell's record over the past 20 games is poor. His team can't defend and he's not managed to work out why. But successful player trading has - until now - been almost impossible with the hand he's been dealt and I suspect that Wilkes/Ellis made up their minds to leave earlier in the season before all the talk of new investment/new name/Craig Gower got started.

I could be persuaded either way about Powell staying on but I don't think he's the worst coach in SL and I worry that we are being linked with some who have under-achieved with pretty decent squads.

Today Rob P says in League Express, should be able to announce by the end of the week signings, hooker, we all know who we expect that to be? winger, a prop and two second row!

I am sorry but I cannot accept that Rob Powell was uninvolved in the selection of either the 2006-2010 squad or the 2011 signings, he has been here six years and was an adviser and indeed the most senior coach after McDermott left before becoming Head Coach.

Olly and Andy Ellis were ok to sign, Olly wanted two years, Andy did not want to go either, they weren't waiting on Wakefield on the off-chance of a licence, that I can assure you - that would be ludicrous.

I'm told by a source connected to one of the players that Rinaldi, Korkidas and Colbon are coming.

I'm told Matt Cook is the second rower - he can't get past last year's two dream team second rowers, whom are contracted at Hull KR so there is no shame in that. The other player is an Australian, not sure who this is but I would take a punt on Chris Armit.

Cheers
Mark

ps I'm not sure where are the promised marquee signings - Gower might be plausible at a push, Witt is also in his prime, but I would be expecting at minimum two current State of Origin players / England internationals to claim that.

pps I have it on good authority that Dorn, Randall, Gale, Bailey, Howell, Pryce and Purdham are on six figure salaries (£100-£125k) and many other players are within £20k of this e.g. Ward, Temata etc. My understanding is that we spend approx £1.35m. That would make sense when you see how thin the squad is, silly contracts taking close to half the cap. We apparently are within £250k of the cap but you can judge for yourself the value derived.

I think its quite clear that Ellis was hoping to leave, yet happy to "settle" for staying.

I heard from a player that Kaufusi(sp?) may actually still be coming, but we'll see.

Seriously?????

How do you have such nonsense on good authority. I would be surprised if you knew what your missus earned.