Exactly what I thought, would he get a sniff in the next 5 years? Could be another Briscoe episode.

Before we talk about Russell and next year, I have it from a good source that a few NRL clubs (for their toyota cup teams) are interested in him, and in fact he could have made the switch before the start of this season but chose to stay.

Big fan of this lad, great chance for him to prove himself

www.thisishullandeastriding.co.u ... story.html "Matty is coming for a month to have a look at us and for us to have a look at him," said McRae. "He's Wigan's player and we are not here to get him out of Wigan but there is the possibility of maybe extending the loan, we'll see later in the month.

www.thisishullandeastriding.co.u ... story.html "Matty is coming for a month to have a look at us and for us to have a look at him," said McRae. "He's Wigan's player and we are not here to get him out of Wigan but there is the possibility of maybe extending the loan, we'll see later in the month.

Not a chance. Russell has an awful lot of improving to do in many of the key areas for a full back, such as positional play, defence and dealing with kicks before he gets anywhere near being the starting full back at Wigan. Hopefully this loan move will be just the experience he needs to improve.

I think unless Wigan sign Slater or Barba then nobody in the world would be able to get close to being your starting full back?
Sam is quite frankly incredible.

so why do others think we should be moving him back to 6......... Leave him where he has space to attack the line and replace Tommy with a suitable replacement....

end of

That makes it sound like he isn't good enough to play 6 because he needs the space playing at full back gives. I think he would be even more devastating at 6 and would have a running game few teams could cope with. As to a realistic player of equal quality to replace Tommy, who is he?

Well he's made the Ull FC 19. So he's in with a shout of playing on Saturday. Looking forward to seeing what he can do.

Is there another specialist FB in the squad?

I think Russell could potentially be a big hit on humberside. Remember the last youngster we sent over there on loan? he turned out ok.

I hope he tears Leeds apart on saturday.

With Horne being out injured the only other possible choice is Whiting, but he has bulked up this year to play 2nd row, and I think we will go with Russell

Good stuff. I will certainly tune into that game on saturday night.

Great performance from young Matty tonight. You have a real star in the making there.

All parties benefit form this loan deal. It's a shame we have to go to other clubs like this but hopefully now that we have an owner who invests in the youth structure and a coach prepared to give them a chance we will have have more Hull youngsters like Crooks coming though.

I saw most of the match tonight between Hull and Leeds and I thought that Russell had quite a good game,in fact Hull fans are saying on the Hull site "sign him up full time).
What I would like to see now is leave him at Hull so that he can get an extended run,if Wigan have to bring him back if circumstances demand it, only do it if we really need him.
It must be hard on a young player trying to get some first team game time to be recalled,find himself in the 19 and then find out that on the day he is left out.
Let the lad develop with a team who can give him extended game time.

Yeah he should be at Hull for the rest of the season. It'll only help him.