If everyone left on mass then it would be even harder holding onto the ones who do sign up with the club.

The real issue is their pathway to the first team. What's the point in an academy if the club are reluctant to use the players who do come through the ranks and stay loyal only to see sh.ite like Jordan Tansey get in ahead of them.

Hard not to agree with that as well.

Because it still allows us to bring some through
Crowther
Jowitt
Johnstone

Wigan & Leeds have and will always cheat the system but despite that we have always managed to develop some excellent players. If our supporters stop supporting via initiatives such as 1873 then we become less able to compete for players and less capable of developing the ones we get while making Wigan and Leeds job easier.

What is the point of people dipping into their pockets to help with junior development when the club throw money away on totally pointless signings of senior players. The amount of money we are paying to first team passengers would give us a very good junior set up.

As in most aspects of life, it's about balance!

Indeed.

Ultimately, the 1873 gives the club some additional income, which we are told goes toward junior development.
IF it didn't exist, the income would need to come from elsewhere or, spending cut from elsewhere. It's that simple.

I don't know the take up on the scheme but, it will certainly generate several £1000 over the year and we should be encouraging more people to join.

The nature of promotion and relegation will make any coach nervous about putting in youngsters at the most critical part of the season and this is the same for any club "under threat".

This is no reason to stop paying into the scheme and every person that drop out, just makes it harder for the club to make ends meet.

One thing that MC should be applauded for is keeping us afloat will the pitiful attendances that we currently have and the young lads will certainly get plenty of game time in the future.

Yes it is simple !!!!

If we had recruited wisely we would have plenty of cash left over to spend more money on junior development. Instead we have urinated money up against a wall by being conned by other clubs and agents into signing people who are not good enough.
It goes even further, if we had someone at the club with the slightest bit of rugby knowledge we may not have been in the perilous situation that we are now in.

Taking injuries out of the situation just tot up the number of players on the side lines who are contributing nothing and have an educated guess at adding up their accumulative wages. If you could cut the amount in half you could replace some of them with decent juniors who would be waiting in the background ready to be called up.

It still riles me that we thought we were being smart by not signing Liam Kay and spending more on the contract of Richard Owen. We had invested time and money in Kay and just when he was ready we ditched him for a player not wanted at Cas.
OK I know that example is history but to me it highlights our approach and attitude towards youth development.

People keep going on about Kay and the others we have let go (I can't even recall their names now - that's how much impact they have made), but no other SL club has deemed them worth a contract.

That suggests the decisions were correct.

It highlights our historical approach - that's fair to say; if we manage to stay up *and* keep hold of Brian Smith for another year though, I really can't see us bypassing young players, being conned by unscrupulous agents or signing over the hill chancers - he's been around the block enough times to avoid all of those pitfalls. I would suggest that the signings he's made since he arrived are a good enough indication that he has an eye for the right player at the right time - and the invigorated performances of players like Miller, Smith (T) and Anderson, and the arrival of Locke, Sio and Tupou would suggest that players will go out of their way to work for him.

I understand the frustration, but cancelling 1873 membership now, or advocating that other people do, is perverse; the timing is totally wrong! And if anyone cancels through annoyance at losing out to the Wigans, Leeds and Shudds of this world - then you probably shouldn't have joined in the first place - it was, and ever will be, thus.

The coach (Webster) was given money to recruit, who else should be making the decisions about which players other than the coach?

In hindsight Webster made some bad choices but at the time many were happy with Paea, Hall and Kirke. The Sammut affair was of Sammuts making and not the clubs and once again who knew the season would become so negative that players wanted out and showed it in their performances, maybe more evidence that Webster was the wrong man.

In efforts to rescue the season the club have made signings and players have left, given the situation, what else would you have done?

No doubt the ins and outs and expansion of the squad has left a few players on the sidelines but this has been an extraordinary season in that regard

If we successfully retain our SL status there's a chance to clear the decks a little and start over again.

How any of that affects the 1873 money is beyond me, that money is ring fenced for junior development and is added to other funding put in by the club.

May be its only me then, but I thought he played much better than Lyne and was light years in front of Riley.

Correct in everything you say about Brian Smith and he is doing a fine job of reversing many of the mistakes made. Lets hope he stays and we build a good club around him. I also know I have harped on about our juniors, I can't see how we can get solid foundations as a club without a change in attitude in that area. Looking in from the outside we are doing far too little.

Lots of good stuff has happened around junior development at the club since 1873 was launched - although we don't make anywhere near enough noise about it, so most people who pay in have no idea.

That said, the current crop has once again been pillaged by the usual suspects - not much we can do about that, other than persist and try to unearth a few gems; realistically, it will be decades before we can stop a young lad and his Dad having their head turned by Leeds, Wigan or Shudds - they have facilities, glamour and success that we can only dream of at the moment. The sad thing is that a lot of these lads, having been promised the moon on a stick, will find themselves on dual reg with little or no chance of seeing first team rugby - whereas if they had a bit of patience and stayed put, they could be playing regular SL and really learning their trade against the big Misters.

Back on topic - we really have become the villains of the Middle 8's; Jamie Peacock and Tyrone McArthy were both banging on about how unfair it is that we've recruited new players on The Superleague Show last night.

If we survive, the narrative is already established - we only managed it because we cheated the system.