Is it true that down caravan park they think a pie chart is a meat pie cut in two

I think a simple descriptive summary is the best way to do this. My questions are ‘how did Hull KR’s academy perform in terms of producing players for Hull KR’s first team?’ and ‘How does that compare with Hull’s academy for their first team?’

I’ve chosen to look at debutants from a 5-year period, 2012-2016. By that point, any excuse we had about starting from scratch after promotion no longer held. The fact that after at least bringing through Welham, Taylor and Watts in the preceding few years, production actually slowed down is in itself interesting - possibly suggesting that it is more about talent than systems. Or maybe the new system was worse than the very little that preceded it. 2012 was the year we adopted ‘building for the future’ as a tag line and appointed a head coach in large part because of his reputation for player development. It was also the year Pearson took charge at Hull. 2016, obviously Rovers went down (some of the games included below are of course Championship matches, and that is a limitation of the comparison with data I’ll find later for Hull) and the academies merged. Any more recent debutants, I feel like it is difficult to judge yet - Elliot Wallis or Harry Bardle who knows at this stage? Similarly It won’t be until a couple of years after the COHA has closed that we’ll get a fuller idea as to whether it was working.

So for each of the included years, Rovers’ debutants and number of games they went/have gone on to play for us (mostly sourced from Wikipedia).

2012), Hallett (2), Robinson (2)
2015: Lawler (60), Marsh (42), Holker (4)
2016: Oakes (24), Cator (17), Wardill (17), Jubb (7), Moran (7)

Although this is about Hull KR, it is maybe worth noting that none of the above who have left Rovers are currently in SL.

So, while those lads individually can be proud of having represented Rovers, I don’t think Rovers overall can be even remotely satisfied with the return on their investment!

Complete waste of time comparing ourselves with each other.

How do we both compare with Wigan and Saints. That's who we both should be chasing and we are a million miles away. That's the reality of the situation despite Mrs B's little point scoring excercise.

I can see why those investing time and energy into Rovers youth over a number of years would choose to turn away at irritating comparative facts, but it's not a wasted exercise. In the context of a lot of chat that Rovers have had the better academy in their SL tenure before COHA, and the best talent from it, I’m just trying to look at the evidence of what each club has produced in terms of players and appearances and retention over the course of recent years as we probably go into another round of hinting that Rovers have come off best from the separation. People can say what they want, obviously. This is about track record of delivery over a decade or more.

What you see at Hull is interesting. The dominating black slice of the pie is not limited to a particular age of player – rather there are probably 4 rough categories within it – Stalwart (e.g. Houghton, Washbrook), Mid career (such Shaul, Bowden, Hadley), Breakthrough (like Matongo, Fash, Logan, Litten), and Newbie (Wynne, Buchanan etc – don’t worry you have credit for Rooks, Bardle to balance this, although the number of games both sides is in the roundings). This implies consistent commitment to a homegrown core. It’s also of note that Hull have produced players “for” Rovers (E.g. Hall, Lee) in the grey slice to a greater extent than the other way round (basically Taylor). Rovers home produced and retained is minimal, isn’t it? There will be some chat about mitigating circumstances of course, but this is my point. The “jam tomorrow” promises going unfulfilled followed by more jam tomorrow promises cycle is all well and good in this regard but the data here is the reality over an extended period.

Of course other questions can be asked. What about looking beyond this time period, ie further back? OK then, we’ll add back Kirk Yeaman and Richard Horne with 375 and 387 appearances respectively, maybe Paul Cooke, Paul King, Tom Briscoe, Lee Radford. What about players produced and going outside the city? Well, we can count a few I suppose – Abdull, Cunningham, Lyne, Briscoe spring to mind and I guess Josh Hodgson was our academy POTY. I think Watts was one of yours and Jon Wilkin obviously, Kris Welham. None of this changes the picture much. If you’re a young player and looking at the evidence, you’d have to say FC are the more credible model for production and retention of Hull talent. If you can demonstrate otherwise, then fine.

As for the comparisons with Wigan and Saints, I'd agree we fall short of them in this and other areas as they are bigger, richer clubs, but tbh I feel we have a decent homegrown core at Hull now and am satisfied it's a blend of experience, quality and potential. I'd feel less comfortable if I were a Rovers fan.

Your attempt to look at the evidence is an abomination. A fun abomination, but still. Also for any budding statisticians (or pedantic ****s), where Mrs B has written that the ‘the data here is the reality’, she means the ‘the data here are the reality’.

I agree though that Hull have a better recent track record, and that we need to look at why we struggled even compared with you (never mind Saints or Wigan) and at what should be done differently from now on. One thing though, there’s either not as much local talent nowadays as people like to think, or both clubs were doing a pretty mediocre job earlier in the decade (Rovers more so, admittedly). When you’re illustrating points about youth development with players who have retired, it’s not a great sign.

A homegrown core has value, I fully accept. However, it is overstated by people associated with successful clubs because it makes them feel warm and fuzzy, whereas believing that the success they enjoyed relied more heavily on simply having more money than the opposition would perhaps be too bleak for them.

In contrast we had five make their debuts, the most for us in the period I looked at, and got relegated.

Now, it could be coincidence - but it’s interesting imo.

Quote: Mild Rover "Your attempt to look at the evidence is an abomination. A fun abomination, but still. https://www.theguardian.com/news/databl ... l-singular And a little homegrown jam tomorrow on top. How very Rovers

Quote: Mild Rover "Your attempt to look at the evidence is an abomination. A fun abomination, but still. https://www.theguardian.com/news/databl ... l-singular And a little homegrown jam tomorrow on top. How very Rovers

On a related topic, Hull beat Wakefield reserves 48-16 away. Cameron Scott hat trick.