I'm totally 100% behind the settled team idea, for the risk of broken record syndrome its what has been absent for the past few years. Its been chop and change due to the circumstances that have been brought about by running instead of walking. Get the team settled, and the finances settled( I believe they are) and hopefully the blooding of young local talent will come but not just for the sake of it. I want to turn up and know the players out on the park, I want to take pride in their performance week in week out. It is a ridiculous scenario having a different team every couple of months and not one that helps to get the disillusioned back in the seats.

Spot On Al.

How about the local lads who played for the Dons in the 1987-89 season
Neil Turner
Mark Roache
Audley Pennant
Milton Pennant
Lol Freeman
Kevin Parkhouse
Mark Gibbon
Alan Carr
Ian Barratt

That was the point I made earlier in the thread. IMHO there are one or two local lads who could quite possibly make the step up, but they are overlooked in favour of other players from the so called 'hot beds' who, looking at results, aren't up to the job.
At least give one or two of them a chance, and if they dont cut it at least you've tried.

Count me out, Ive seen the consultent today and has said my knees are like a Lunar Landscape from the MRI scans Ive just had.

Keep having a paddle in the sea Dave!

Yes Geoff we did have some great local players as you mentioned ,but look how many clubs we had back then around the villages,Bentley,Askern,Rossington,Armthorpe,ICI,Moorends,Goldthorpe,Skellow and many be a few more,now we have two, Bentley and Toll Bar ,if we are to progress you need players to perform at a higher level,the step up from amateur is hard as the game is much faster,even at the lower levels.Bentley and Toll Bar should join forces and try to play in the conference instead of struggleing on season to season playing in Yorkshire one and two ,then maybe we can get back to the days of having a team made up of local boys.Toll Bar have some great facilities and good youth development,while Bentley have players with more experience of playing semi pro , but this will never happen as both clubs want to keep their identity. Surely it would benefit both the clubs and the Dons,and this could give local players something to aspire too,using this as a Dons feeder club.

We don't like mergers on here chunkster (it's a touchy subject).
You just said that we had a better pool to pick from when we had more local clubs like Askern, Rosso etc ....so why would we want to make it fewer.
Besides .....are we just giving the Marauders youngsters up to Hull etc..what about them?

are in the Pennine League.

I said that as my opinon,as i feel we need players to play at a higher level than the lower reaches of the yorkshire league.Howard Roberts and Brian have a good group of young lads at Moorends,as i have coached most of them on the scholarship for the last two seasons,(until its demize),but with the senior team folding it would be hard for them to progress into a team with no old heads to guide and protect them.The Dons need to have better links with the local clubs and help them produce players that want to play at a higher level,not just to turn out on a saturday and play social rugby.We lost three really good young lads to Hull KR off the scholarship last year and it breaks my heart to see players leave the club after we have put time and effort into improving them as players only for them to be cherrypicked away from us.We need to start the scholarship program again ,there are plenty of the previous coaching staff that would get back involved,and it would cost next to nothing.

Totally agree with the above,but---
If the above is true and it would cost next to nothing---why was the scholarship abandoned in the first place?

A Good Scholarship should be the nucleus of our club and for our future.

No idea,it was all self funded under Dave Marsall separate from the main club