Cas fan in peace. Having watched & enjoyed a couple of DP sides at Cas I think some of you are underestimating the value of his structures. When he has the right players & it clicks, it’s great, when it doesn’t it’s still above average. The standard in SL is dire at the minute (& I said the same when we won the LLS) so with the majority the squad having a year of DP under their belts, coupled with the incoming players, I’d honestly be expecting to finish above Hull, Cas, Huddersfield at worst & likely higher if things go well.

That sounds like a valid point. The one thing that has been apparent this season is structure. Defence has been excellent almost all season in structure and line speed.

I can 100% see why he has brought in these few players for next season. It will as you say be a plan to play a certain way and execute specific plays.

Reality is that in 80% of our games there’s not been a need to go above 2nd gear. The core is their and I have an appreciation for Powell I’ve built over the season that makes me think he will want a big year next season and given the backing should see it realised to some degree.

I agree with all that.
I just think we need to manage expectation
For first season being above those 3 teams would be a good achievement.
Anything else is a massive success.

I’d be okay with 9th but with a full cap spend and the coaching set up in place I don’t believe it would be unreasonable to expect a higher finish somewhere mid table between 9-5th. We do have 2 x England internationals joining too.

clearly I m better at watching rugby than you are at reading , the point I was making is that our current starting 17 would struggle against the starting 17 of most of the bottom teams in super league. I m not sure quite what signing Russel or Truman has to do with that assertion as they ain’t in our starting 17. We’ve had a relatively injury free season, playing largely part timers, we’ve made some good signings for next year which I guess if we were already capable of beating the bottom 3 or 4 clubs we wouldn’t have done.

So I m with Powell current squad isn’t up to sl signings which is why we’ve signed 7-9 new players

My first point was regards the current 17 and that I disagree that we wouldn’t be able to beat the bottom few teams in SL with our current 17. I’ve watched almost all recent games and they are terrible getting pumped week in /week out almost by large scores and looking largely hopeless in performance. It says a lot when part time London aren’t even bottom.

If you call relatively injury free season missing almost 8-10 players for a cluster of games and having a few medium length injuries to key and pivotal players and positions relatively injury free then I disagree with that too. We’ve just played a string of games games without halfbacks, missed Atoni, Rodwell, Uele, Cozza, and Bain (2 x spells) for 4/5 games and more, McGillvray and Thornley having to be managed through season. It’s only recent couple of games we are looking a bit better and the fact we have good depth in this league but that is different from injuries sustained. Perhaps your memory is about as good as my ability to watch rugby and read.

Im not sure what you mean your with Powell on the 7-9 signings. Im not sure anyone would suggest we return to SL without strengthening.

I don't think either is true. We've had some terrible spells with injury this season, where we haven't been able to name a fit 21 players a few times. Our halves have missed a huge chunk of our season, and so have our props, plus Thornley and McGillvery have been out quite a bit. There have been games where we've played with one prop and had to play second rowers in the middle and hood at 13.

So you're saying that if we can beat the poorest SL teams in the division atm why would we improve our team next season, seriously? well, because we don't want to compete at that end of the table for one, London will also be gone. Also of course we need new players we've got a few that are retiring and a few that are another year older by the time next season starts and may choose to stay at this level. It's also been demonstrated this season when we've had injuries and players playing out of position that we need a better quality bigger squad for SL. Plus we've got an owner who has aspirations of making this team more than also runs, so being potentially able to beat 2 or 3 poor SL teams this year won't cut it, from what he's said.

No I actually have a pretty good memory , put simply my point on Powell is that we are adding a coterie of experienced super league players to ensure we can compete next season.

I honestly think that people on here that compare sl to championship standard are making a big mistake. Full time training is such a massive boost to players fitness and team cohesion.

We have quite a few players that have been absolutely outstanding this year , they would be peripheral players in super league. Power to their elbows but to think that this squad would roll in and beat starting squads of aforementioned clubs is kidding themselves .

As regards injury free yes I accept at times we’ve had 8-10 players out, equally we’ve been playing teams that in one case could only field 15 fit players. Also when weve had forwards out we’ve been able to replace them with players that would walk into any other championship team .

I m happy that we are strengthening for next year because if we were fielding the same squad we’d probably finish second to bottom - admittedly that’s an opinion and one that can’t be tested

Matt Parcell has announced that he will be going back home to Australia at the end of the season.

Yes I read same article , at moment we have smith and Doyle only signed smith and Doyle so an area of real weakness , looking at uk players that are available I wonder if we will give hood another year

As far as I know that's always been the plan. Parcell was just fan talk.

As PT says below I think Parcell was just wishful thinking. I think it was even me many weeks back suggesting we look at him as an option to be honest.

Like you say I expect Hood will be announced soon for a year until there’s more quality on the market at 9.

I think that's exactly the right point.
We should wait for the right quality rather than panic buy for the sake of it.
Hood and Doyle will be fine for next year.

Not really sure that Hood and Doyle will be ok for next year.I know it's a project and not a one year thing but we have talked about being in the top half of the table and I see hooker as a very important component of that.I don't want to come over as moaning but I see all these top players coming in and think we are perhaps neglecting the most important position of all in todays game.Maybe there is a quota problem,a cap issue or just nobody available, or DP thinks, as does a previous poster, that Doyle is SL ready.Hope so.

As discussed I think it’s a mixture of the above.

Doyle is ready for the SL step it seems.

If Hood re-signs short term it will be because he’s the best available otherwise until 2026.

Smith may be in an out but isn’t fully ready yet (a loan spell in championship would do him well).

Kay will be cover in emergency too as will Russell.