Rumours Warrington are bringing in 3 prop signings and Mike Cooper hasn’t had his contract renewed. He’d be a good signing possibly alongside Dudson.

Agree the recruits have been well mediocre to be kind and god awful to be blunt , but I’m still of the opinion that this team although no world beaters is good enough to see us through this season and onto pastures new going forwards . Poaching needs to give em the rounds of the kitchen as to their performance and attitude of late . If some of our so called stars think by playing like they do will get the a gig at another club they are living on cloud cuckoo , even the top tear of the championship would turn their nose up at them .

I think Warrington are the biggest indicator of if you don’t have the fire power up front, it doesn’t matter who you have behind them, they simply won’t lay the platforms for any play.

In fairness to W Poaching he as been left with a ageing team even most the imports are getting past there best .Think it is a case of hope W Poaching can keep them fit enough to get 2 or 3 wins

Totally agree.

All teams need to have sufficient forward power, to allow their backs to perform.

Most definitely alegend ,by hook or by crook we need to get this team over the winning line enough times to Secure our future .on a different subject but still very relevant,I’ve just watched Craig Bellamy and his coaching career ,and how he put systems in place to weed out the players not up to it before they get to sign ,and was saying the system is running at around 90% success rate . Basically the players go into the outback on a gruelling mental and physical set of challenges and are rated by independent trained staff ,those that get through get to sign for the club and those that don’t are shown the door . I reckon if we put this system in place at Belle vue nowadays we wouldn’t be able to raise a team . I know it’s a world apart and it isn’t feasible but it’s easy to see why the Storm and the top NRL teams are light years ahead of our holiday camp recruitment and training techniques. Tough love I’m afraid is the only way going forwards ,we simply don’t seem battle hardened and come of second best in most encounters and facets of our games .

It's not holiday camp recruitment, it's budget recruitment.

When you have unlimited funds and you are the top pick for every player, its easy to just weed people out.
We have limited funds and are the bottom pick.
You can do the outback test by all means but our pass mark will be much much lower.

The Storm spend as much as any other NRL team, within 95% of the cap, no less. I’ve seen the interview with Matty Johns face to face. Bellamy created a dynasty at the Storm and called them ‘soft’ when he took over. The Storm are well known for not signing many Origin or international players, but creating them. Obviously we are a million miles away and so are every other SL for that matter. But creating that culture and sustaining it, only Saints have managed to do something similar over here in SL since it’s inception.

Yet against Hudds we were mullered in the forwards, their post contact metres, their dummy half play, they were far superior, but if TJ doesn't put a foot in touch, we win?!

How did we finish 5th 2 seasons running signing players that basically no-one else wanted? Grix, Finn, England, Hurst, even BJB's stock had dropped by that time. Like I've said before, most of that 'team' hasn't been replaced adequately, I know it's not an exact science, and a bit of luck is involved, but that's the bottom line, out of about say 20 signings in the last 3-4 years, there's probably about 4 who you could call a success. Westerman, Tanginoa......yeah i'm struggling now to come up with anyone else?! Like I said on here the other day, I reckon in relative terms, we've shelved out more money on players that haven't delivered, than on those I've mentioned that no-one else wanted.

This season we went for a smaller squad but we just forgot to ensure that those we signed were of better quality.

Kettykat B Smith came did it and it worked ,players did not like it, so he went .Are we now reping the result of that of that or is it to long ago T Smith is brother seem to improve teams were ever he goes, and if you look at HKR now it is not because of money more of getting a team fit and to know what to look for in a player .Know W Poaching as not signed a lot but think there as good if not better than most of the players signed in the last 3 year. So hopefully he knows what he wants in a player which is a start

Yeah but the likes of Lineham & Gaskell are still 'name' players if you like, it's subjective if you think they were actually any good at their previous clubs, it's an opinion I suppose, but even those 2, along with Kopzack, Brough, Atkins to name but 3 are 'bigger' names than Grix, Finn, England etc

So what your saying poptart is that the players that are running out for us are playing to 100% of their capabilities, I’d say nowhere near and more like 50% , and a few are obviously more but when you have too many not pulling their weight you could throw a few NRL superstars into the mix and your on a hiding to nowhere. It’s a team sport and for us to have any success with the current squad they all have to pull their weight , without the forwards making ground the backs can’t do their stuff . That’s what is all the more frustrating because they aren’t as bad as they look ,yes we won’t be challenging the playoff this season but we should be a lot more competitive than we are . Said it for years and I stand by this , you can tell what we are going play like in the game and get effort wise in the first 10 mins , with the hit ups of the forwards and the energy in the tackling of the team . Take Kelepi he’s a shadow of the player he was ,why , I bet your bottom dollar if he was picked up by saints or Wigan he’d be a world beater again, he just doesn’t have to run his blood to water for us and that’s just not picking on him ,there are plenty more to choose from ,but he’s our star player at present . It’s attitude and pride in the shirt/club that get you up for a game and we are sadly lacking in both at present , and poaching needs to get that into them asap .

I believe the players revolted when tougher regimes were brought in. I don't know who, or whether it were a few players. Hopefully, the ones involved in the rebel are no longer involved. Do players not realise, that probably one of the reasons why other teams are more successful if the training is stricter, and if they moved on it would be harder.

I do like WP, not sure he's the right personality for this gig yet, but TS would be on my shopping list, it would just depend on whether big brother has warned him to steer clear