Hull have placed high hopes on him, great hands, kicking game and tackles well. Still very young though, currently playing open age with Wests.

How old is he? 16?? Hope the Wests forwards are protecting him!!

I know its fashionable to bash Horne on here but the fact he has collected more representative honours and made more training squads than Cooke would suggest he has been better or at the worst a similar level of player so your claim lacks sense. Whether either is truly decent you can debate. The sad truth is that the Hull area has always had a terrible record with regards to producing a top half. Then again the British game in general hasn't had many great domestic performers in the last 20 years and no international class ones since Schofield.

If Houghton played 7 at junior rugby, could he be a shout for the derby, with Heremaia at 9?

No

Kirk Yeaman used to be play number 6 when i played against him for Ideal - wouldnt have him near the half back role!

Nah.

16 I think and apparently more than holding his own.

It is not just half backs that we do not produce. As an area with a population that dwarfs Wigan, St Helens or Castleford to name but three small towns, why don't we produce players of SL quality that they all do ? Even in the glory days of the 80's our team had very few local lads. One theory is that we have a small number of junior "super teams" where it is too easy for the rising "stars" How good are our junior coaches compared to Wigan/Saints ? Andy Last has resided over the juniors for a lot of years with precious little success - is he as good as other SL coaches at that level ? I think we have let a lot of local lads go who did have potential - Josh Hodgson, Craig Hall, Danny Washbrook who would have been better than drafting in West Riding lads and aging Aussies. I was embarrassed by the Bradford postponement with only 3 local lads in the squad and the majority coming from the West Riding. Until the nucleus of the squad is locally produced we will always be in a state of flux relying on countless new mercenaries on an annual basis

That leaves a debate open as to whether Horne is a half back or not. Ok he has played most of his games there I believe, but is that really his best position? He certainly was not selected for GB as a HB all be it he may well have played there when Long took his beer back home on the plane.

He [iwas[/i selected as a HB. More than once IIRC. He also made the SL Dream Team at 7 in 2004.

Chris kitchen looked a great prospect and Never made, I always liked Hewitt, but just lacked pace.

Coming through we have 3 outstanding halfbacks in Tyson-wilson, Abdul and wood, it is up to the club to do the best they can with these so that at least one makes it.

You have a point, but the three you mentioned I have to disagree, at full strength non of those would get into our 17, they ave moved on done well, but I don't regret releasing any of those.

Hodgson, Hall and Washbrook would not improve the FC squad, as you say, were allowed to leave for good reason.

How many top class anything has Hull ever produced? The whole area is the epitome of under achievement