any idea if any of the 20s getting signed this year, seems to be just the 18s? From the games I've seen there looked a few potentials.

It could of course be that he isn't that good and they weren't really interested.

How foolish of them to contradict Justine, that huge promoter of young British talent.

Aye, that'll be it.

Very good player is Louis, rovers offered him a bit more money so he went there, think Hull didnt offer him as much, as we have J Briscoe (who we may see in the 1st team this weekend) and Saul Beavis who is another fantasic prospect coming through in the same position.

Be suprised if Louis didnt make a good SL player.

I think it is more to do with how strong your 18's are as at that particular age group Martin Dunn really wanted to make a impact and put his stamp on your club so he assembled a really strong squad.

Wow. Just, wow.

understand the 20s are having to use local amatuers to fill gaps having recently losing some players recently?

Having 2 SL clubs in the town is a good thing IMHO.
Twice as likely that our local talent will make SL players just down to the fact that twice as many will get the chance, I think the more kids have a go at that level and the more SL players that are found between ourselves the better.
I mean you only need for two 18 year old FB's to appear at a similar time and one is gunne be sat bumming around the reserves possibly just because of the politics that happen in sporting clubs instead of him being any worse then the player getting his chance in the first team.

Sounds nice that.

The reality is somewhat different though.

What is your take on it?

Acadamy is all about player development and there hasn't been enough players of the right calibre for quite some time so to suggest that because Rovers are in SL this will somehow change is over simplistic imho.

I saw the U-20's last Sunday and they were absolutely terrible. Matt Cook was head and shoulders above anything on the field and even he cant get first team action at the moment. Now don't get me wrong i didn't know all the players in the Rovers side (except a few) but if the better U-18's were playing i'd be worried and if they weren't i would want to know why.

I think these things do work as supply and demand. The assumption has been that providing youngsters with more opportunities will improve things, but if the underlying problem is a lack of raw material you'll just end up lowering standards.
I read an article about Russian football the other day, where they have introduced quotas for Russian players. This has, according to the article, had mixed effects - young Russian players have got complacent as their places are much safer and Brazilians and Africans are simply applying for Russian passports.
It is a tough one for the RFL - there is only so much you can do with rules and quotas, they've done as much as they can, IMO.

That's 1 thing that has confused me whenever I have seen your 18's and 20's play, the better 18's are not getting the chance to play for the 20's even though they seem far superior players.

The cynic in me thinks its more to do with how it looks from the outside looking in as this practice has lead to your 18's been in the 'elite' group.

My point is that it creates more chances.
If the raw talent isn't there then that is a diffrent situation.