Howarth ain't a hooker, if nothing else Sunday highlighted this fact. Credit to the lad for staying on despite an obvious injury, but ensuring we have two specialist 9's rather than converted backrowers is a step forward.

Nothing but a gut feeling, but I think Howarth will play back row more than he will hooker.

Sio appears to be someone who can cover a number of positions so I'm looking forward to him getting started. I hope it also means Godinet will get a prolonged run at #6.

Bazzo - Souns like there may be more to come - Any further info?

Spot on. I wonder if there is one Troll out there with 3 user names. No prizes for guessing the three.

Why do we still refer to this position as hooker anyway as this particular skill was defunked years ago. For me i would play three big forwards in the front row and the holy trinity of scrum half, stand off and loose forward at the back the later three being the crucial link up with the three quarters. The loose forward has to have a good pair of hands the likes of derek turner and the brilliant Knocker Norton, these positions are the positions that have made teams tick in the past.

Agree with this.
Howarth is a steady enough player when in the 'hooker' role but I prefer him at loose forward, where I believe he played in his last stint with us. He has the skills to be a good loose forward. He's a grafter and I for one am pleased he's re-joined us.

Interview with Sio from a couple of weeks back.

rlhttp://www.dailymercury.com.au/news/soft-spoken-sio-packs-punch/2655972/rl

Plus the fact if Washbrooke is leaving this is a very important role to fill it is imperative we get the right man as i say must have good hands and him and the scrum half and stand off must be able to read each others play.

Sounds like we have another Aiton. He loves the defence side of the game......works for me.

the only video of him on YT he has number 13 on and looks too big to play hooker. Gets smashed by Korben Sims too!

Sio played at 9 against England but in the game Godinet took all the attention as his interchange.
I just watched it, he's lively and a strong tackler so looks like a good signing to me.

The added bonus being someone who can play a similar game to Godinet. When they are both on the field, I reckon they'll really disrupt teams.

Hope so but thats a big call without seeing him play! Might be masterstroke going forward but when Aiton came over he had 6 years first grade experience and over 100 NRL games under his belt. It's a big ask for a young bloke just turned 22 to be thrown into a team that hasn't won for four months. Given our situation we need any signings we make to hit the ground running so i hope he's a good 'un.

All I meant was he liked defending.
Now I've seen the Samoa games he is clearly a good player

The only problem I have with half of these players is, they seem to use us as a stepping stone to move onto bigger English clubs, and in the mid to long term this is something that we have to sort out if we want to move forward as a club. Paul Aiton, Talima Tautai etc, moving on to Leeds and Wigan after seemingly only being here for five minutes, I know we are hamstrung so to speak as to who becomes available, but it's just a bit sickening when Trinity seem to give these guys a break and a chance over here, and they then jump ship pretty quickly. Even going back to Henry Paul, I didn't see Wigan taking a chance on a Junior Kiwi until we took a chance on him and he almost beat them on his own over at Central Park. I remember the arrogance of Wigan fans that night saying he'd look good in a Wigan shirt, and low and behold.....I really hope Sunday's improved performance is the start to us not being a 'feeder' club if you like, and that includes our own like the promising Johnstone. It's going to be a long hard road, but if we do get out of this season's mess, like I have said, we can't keep producing our own talent, and keep bringing overseas players to the club simply to then let them go onto pastures new so quickly.

I concur with what your saying but I'm afraid until we're on a level playing field with the 'bigger' clubs that's how it will be.
Players chase money simple as that. Very few of them display the same loyalties as us supporters and it's hard to stomach but that's life!

Any clues Bazzo?