Quote: wigan pie man "
i agree with what terry o connor said on boots and all.
its not the talented young uns weve let go, its the talented world class established players that we have failed to replace with players of similar quality.'"
Exactly.
Quote: wigan pie man "they mentioned Barrett, Faz, Rads...................look what we have now in those 3 positions alone.
tez did mention the number of wigan born and bred players we had in our successful eras.......ie rads, faz, cass, etc.......so maybe if did keep hold of our home grown talent (like stains and leeds) we might develop em into decent players who had pride in the shirt.'"
Just because they are home grown though does not mean they will end up world class and it is a myth that Saints have developed home grown talent anyway. Leeds are much better in this respect but Saints have had very few home grown players in their trophy winning sides. What they have been good at is doing what O'Connor said, replacing class players with other class players but they have mostly come from outside the club.
When Lyon went they signed Gidley is an example but the likes of Fozzard, Gilmour, Garnder, Wilkiin, Sculthorpe, Long, Iro and so on did not start their careers with Saints. In fact the sucessful Saints sides of the SL era have, I am sure, always had a majority of bought in players be they from overseas or from the UK. It has worked for them and their players have seemed to have had plenty pride in their shirt despite their origins.
Dave
