Agree with Boothroyd, looked a real handful to deal with.

I don’t know much about Isaiah… but the dynasty is strong…
agree Boothroyd looked OK …I thought Uele looked a bit lost in the structure… not sure how long he had been in the squad before Boxing Day …

If I remember rightly he'd only been here 2 weeks, so it's not that much of a surprise he wasn't up with some of the others but imo there was enough there that once he was fully match fit he'd make some serious meters in the Championship as you say.
My main point though was comparing the 2 new props with the stats that got posted, since apart from that boxing day runout and some highlights we don't know that much about either. It was a bit of a surprise even though they play differently they had surprisingly similar stats across the board, obviously you can only take so much out of them but they were both pretty impressive.
Agree with Boothroyd, wasn't looking out for him at first but there's no doubt he caught my eye. I don't know how long he'd been in the Country at that point but he was fit and ready to go. Looking forward to seeing Bain and Vagana hopefully in one of these warm-ups before the season starts and then we'll really know what kind of pack we've got on our hands.

Yep I think Caleb was the last to arrive which is why I didn’t said it didn’t mean much.

I think there is a belief that all Aussie RL players are these supercharged highly trained full time athletes - they are not.

Outside of the top flight they have jobs and train when they can. The club training is not FT and probably on a par with somewhere like Dewsbury. It’s certainly not what they will get with us which is basically SL.

I’m guessing Boothroyd may be different in that he was until recently part of the Aussie equivalent of a FT Academy? If so I think it showed in his fitness and eagerness.

Caleb and Bain have been playing part time footy and good though it is, it’s not SL standard. Fitness is down to the player mainly and some train and live better than others. Both will benefit hugely from a FT environment. I expect Vagane to be the same and I expect them to hit form at the Galway point of the season.

Exactly what happened with Atoni.

It'll be interesting to see where Vagana plays. From the very short YouTube clip I've seen he looks to have the athleticism of a second rower.

Currently for the 'middle' positions we've already got Atoni, Bowden, Bain, Cozza Uele, Shaw and rumours of one more coming in shortly. Wouldn't be surprised to see him used in the second row at some point.

He will play prop I expect. He played all but 1 of his games this season in that position.

Cozza played 13 Boxing Day and has a good pair of hands so I fully expect he will play 13.

Bain can play prop or 13 too. He could interchange with Cozza.

Just need someone now who can cover fullback and the centres.

I thought the same on what little I have seen admittedly. Looks quite athletic on the 6 hit ups I have seen. With a bit of coaching could be a nightmare to defend against playing on an edge.

This could be where the Wigan link comes into play short term. I would be surprised if Hampshire doesn't play a few games for us this term if we have a problem in the halves or fullback.

I'd agree as things are now, but I've also heard we're close with a young prop from the NRL so we'll have quite a bit of depth if it comes off. And Ashurst, Pitts and Griffin are all 34, I'd expect at least two them to move on at the end of this year. There's an opportunity to experiment if we want to.

Interesting about the prop. We pretty much look to have a lot of quality there unless it’s a special player that we see as a long term investment then great.

I’d have thought because of what you mentioned with Griffin, Ashurst and Pitts that we’d be looking at a second row for the future.

I have no issue with us dipping into the overseas market for quality players for the next few years or even the short term this year.

I would like to see us try sign Judah Rimbu who’s a halfback/hooker was great with PNG and earned a train trial with Dolphins in NRL.

Would imagine a whole host of players have come on the market. I hope we can cherry pick a couple of the best young talent to see us through to SL.

I don't watch much NRL so I can't really judge any of them. But we look well set for the Championship, and any signing going forward need to be with SL in mind. We'll definitely need to upgrade the halves and hooker, and probably the back row and three quarters.

As it stands Hampshire is the only cover they've got for Field, French and Smith. I think he could end up playing a fair bit for Wigan this year.

Could do with a Jimmy Leuliai or a Steve Diamond.

Alternatively, are there any good up and coming full backs around.