I stayed at the same hotel with the Saints players at the first Magic weekend, when they gave Wigan a good seeing-to. Long and Cunningham to name but 2 looked well rough on the following morning.
Personally I think a code of conduct in terms of a written set of rules in itself is not the answer. I'd guess that the most successful clubs are those with a culture that starts with inspirational leadership and where all its members, particularly the players and coaching staff, buy into what the club is trying to achieve, and the board resource those ambitions and shared objectives appropriately. I know this sounds a bit like management theory bollox, but I just doubt that Saints or Leeds have a list of rules about who can drink when and how much. The players seem to feel a collective responsibility to put and keep the clubs where they belong and a pride and urgency that ours lack.
In a way, the injuries disasters of the last couple of seasons have served to let our players, coach and CEO off the hook. There have been (up to now) no stated ambitions and no consequences for not delivering anything on the pitch. Whilst we all had a good laugh at Morgan for saying Rovers could win the Grand Final this year, at least he was setting an ambitious goal. Agar is so downbeat anyway you wonder whether the "target" was one of consolidation in 11th spot. We might just do that if a few of Bradford's results go our way.
To me, the drinking thing is a symptom of the complete lack of accountability and passion the players feel for the club and the general lack of consequences for not behaving professionally, rather than being an issue in itself.
