Well, I wasn't specifically responding to you. But to be honest this wasn't what came across to me from your posts...

Really? I have been very consistent over last couple of years. You identify the top potential stars, and in the majority of cases you know at 16. You introduce them young to first team, to show them what they are aiming for and what they may need to improve. You look to give them two or three games first year, 5 to 6 second year, then you fully integrate them. All subject to them continuing to show the required credentials.

What you don't do is specifically wait until they are too old to play in the academy, or just hold back as you don't want to rest a current first teamer.

That has always been my view.

The Sinfield model is perfect, and he wasn't the only one from that era.

No it wasn't check you facts.

He debuted towards the end of one season, and the season after the next he made 22 appearances. Where do you get your five years?

And my point is more introduce them young and gradually.

Or in reality it is nothing like Sinfields introduction.

As I said, I wasn't specifically responding to you. If my view is the same as yours then we have no disagreement. So while I hadn't realised you were arguing the same thing (as I wasn't arguing with you anyway ) it 's nice to know we're on the same page.

A couple of notes on Sinfield:

It's easy to look back on the way his induction to senior grade panned out and assume a well laid plan. I for one though can't remember the circumstamces in which his chances came. Injuries may well have dictated their timing.

Secondly, in 2000 and 2001 the players he was trying to displace were not the cast and characters of the most successful period in the club's history. This is another of the many differences in historical context that mean the same model may be difficult to apply.

Also, Kevin Sinfield is a special player. You can't assume that what works for one works for all.

This isn't intended to dispute your ideal model, which I agree with, but just as a note of caution on the way that model might be applied in practice.

So by the time he is 19 he is a first team regular - not getting farmed out to a championship club?

Rugby League is a seventeen man game. Please do not say you are really going to scrape the barrel and make out substitute is not a regular? I expected much better.

So now we are clear he made two appearances out of the last three games in 1997. He made two appearances the year after where we challenged for the league and reached the first grand final. Then he was a first team regular the next season making 21 appearances (according to yourself, 22 according to other sites).

That is how to integrate a potential star. No need for championship rugby, and no need to wait until he outdoes the academy teams. This despite having the challenge of replacing arguably the best stand off of the super league era, and one of our best loose/back row ever.

Not even that. He was 18 when a regular.

He was also the exceptional talent of his generation.

Some players are ready much earlier than others. How old was Jamie Peacock when he became a regular at Bradford?

Not to mention that things have changed in the last 15 years. Players are far bigger, stronger and faster, and they tackle much harder. You might get away with a young half or winger playing each week but there's a reason why most forwards are older than they used to be.

I dread to think of how a 16 year old would manage at loose forward today.

Surely the integration of any young layer depends on ability, potential, physicality and opportunity.

Even if a players is ready for SL, how do you fully integrate them into a team full of international who are performin well. Opportunities will be limited, however, in this game there will always be oportunities through injury

Really, how so?

Sinfield year 1. 2 games.
Singleton year 1. 1 game

Sinfield Year 2. 2 games.
Singleton year 2. 1 game

Sinfield year 3, 21 games
Singleton Year 3 10 games and counting

1 is the player of his generation, playing as a half back, ball handling loose. The other is a prop.

I see no significant differences in how they have been handled. Factoring in that props are generally introduced at a slower pace because of their role I think Singleton has been progressed in a similar fashion to Sinfield.

Ahhh, so it is three years now, not the erroneous five.

Sinfield was 16, and was making 21 appearances at 18. Singleton is 20. Sinfield made all but 2 of those appearances in the forwards, the same as Singleton. Sinfield forced himself into a side that were winners, and had achieved something this side hasn't even managed yet, Singleton is picked for his 10 due to injuries.

Sorry but if you can't see the difference, your problem.

By the way, the point earlier about the fact Sinfield was an exceptional talent, completely accepted, so on that score unfair to compair the two above. I was just dissagreeing to the notion that they have been handled the same, because they haven't.

Are you sure Sinfield didn't get his opportunities through injuries? Genuine question, I can't remember.

Also, it might be a little stretched to claim that Sinfield's task in forcing his way into a team of winners was the same as Singleton's. Yes the 1999 vintage managed something this current team haven't managed, but it's also worth pointing out that this side has managed (6 times in 9 years) something the 1999 team hadn't.

Incidentally, having finished 3rd, Leeds 1999 vintage lost both their play-off matches and in so doing accomplished something this current crop haven't since 2006 in exiting at their earliest opportunity.

Incidentally, Kevin was on the bench for the first of those play-off games and not selected for the second. He also didn't play in the penultimate regular round at table-toppers Bradford. So while very much part of the first team squad, he was hardly first choice at that stage. His omission from the Murrayfield line up the following year, while it did raise eyebrows, wasn't the sort of thing that happens to an automatic pick.

What is three years? Hard to run a comparison of Singleton's first five years in the first team, as he's only had three.

One is a prop, the other a ball handling loose forward/half back. If you can't see the difference, your problem.


You think Sinfield played/plays the same role as Singleton?

Which side was that? Sinfield was eased in over a few years. He was eased into a team in real transition from the Murray years. Sinfield didn't win anything until 8 seasons after his debut.

The point was not to put down what this side has achieved, but highlight the fact that Sinfield forced himself into a team that had just won a trophy also. On the other hand, Singleton is only making his run of appearances this season, because of injuries to others. Not that I don't think Singleton should be in anyway, just stating the bloody obvious of what is really happening.

Therefore the comparison that Singleton is been handled the same as Sinfield was, is completely inaccrurate, and really stretching the truth.

I would still like to be more convinced that injuries didn't play a part in Sinfield's first sustained run in the team.

I don't have clear recollection of that period (largely because I was away at Uni for a chunk of the season) but my experience has been that I can recall very few youngsters being given a real shot without injuries to senior playetrs clearing the way. Without those injuries, it's generally been the odd game here and there, frequently including cup games and games against weaker opposition.

Mark Glanville was the loose that year and in his two years at Leeds made 46 appearances. Daryl Powell was stand off then, and I believe missed 3 games in 99, and in 2 of them Harris took over at stand off (although Sinfield only played at stand off twice that year anyway).

He didn't replace those players. They both still played in almost all of the 21 games Sinfield featured in. The question is what happened to the players whose places he took.

Quote from Singleton in the YEP:

“At Hunslet I am playing against men, it’s better than playing in the under-20s and it makes it an easier step up into Super League.”

Never mind what a player thinks, the direct transition from U19s to first grade on a regular basis must be the only route, and you're stuffed if you hit 19 and haven't made it.

What? Did you read the whole article? Did you get it from the YEP interview or somewhere else?

It comes across clear as day he has felt quite dissallusioned with it. That quote you highlighted was like an after thought to balance out the rest of his interview.

He even highlighted how other clubs had younger than him playing. It needs to be read without the blue and amber spectacles on.

I didn't get that impression from the interview unless the printed version is different to the online one?

The Cumbrian admits it has been a hard road so far, but says the recent run of games has made up for the frustration of his time as a nearly-man in the squad.
The former Barrow Island junior added: “I have been at four different clubs now, but this is the one I want to be at
“Hopefully I can carry on. I feel like I am part of it now, I have been hanging around for three years really, getting a game every year and even this year I wasn’t getting much of a look in until we had a few injuries.
At 20 Singleton is one of the youngest front-rowers in Super League, but he insisted: “When I wasn’t playing regularly I felt like I was too old – I was looking across at other teams and thinking there’s 20 year olds in there.
Rhinos’ partnership with Kingstone Press Championship neighbours Hunslet means Singleton has played first-team rugby every week, if fit, even when he wasn’t getting in at Leeds.
“I can’t say it hasn’t helped me,” he said. “At the end of the day, if I am not playing in the first team here that’s the only place I can play.


Yep, those comments are full of enthusiasm for the way he has had to do it.

Much better we help players believe life and their sport is fully of easy options and never a challenge

Yep, because that would be the only other option



Courtesy of left or right no centre ground Richie