defo another deal for gilly, our best one on one defender, always turtles the opposition, still one of the fastest at the club, rearly caught out of position, great at finishing tries and his back up game still up there with the best, gilly has been one of our best signings in super league era

It would worry me to see too much experience leave in one fell swoop. Added to the fact that he's playing as well as ever means I'd give him at least 12 months.

Whether he'd accept that or not is another matter...

I think he'd accept another 12 months with an option of a further year after that myself.

I agree with the sentiments of most here, he's an experienced head, works as hard as anyone else on the team, has a good turn of pace and seems to be a great example to all of the youngsters looking to replace him. I sometimes forget he's only been playing here since 2004!!!

I also seem to remember a few people being a touch dismissive when we signed him.

i wouldn't be upset to see him go, but i wouldn't be upset if we offered him a new deal, he is a good, underrated player, but we have lots of backrowers and more coming through

He can go.

We have players in abundance at second row or people who can cover that position. Ashurst and Dixon can play more next year.

He is expendable and will free up cap room.

This is true and something that concerns me these days with regards to many of our fans' attitudes towards signing other superleague players. It seems like to many fans if they play in the superleague but not at Saints they aren't good enough to pull on a redvee.

I seem to remember similar dismissiveness towards Pryce's signing (although this may have had as much to do with something else).

I for one thought paul anderson was too old


I've learnt my lesson

Ditto

we had his best 2 yrs IMO, DA thought he could easily do 1 more as well.

Fair comment but just to play devils advocate

... its all well and good us freeing loads of cap space but who/what are we freeing it for?

1. We're covered in most positions other than prop.
2. Most of the kids have already negotiated new contracts this year so their salaries should be set for next season.
3. We are already losing, at least one if not two or three of our highest wage earners in Long, Cayless and KC.
4. We are allegedly spending under the cap this year.

Exactly, there is no point going out of our way to make room on the cap if no-one is available to bring in. We already have a very weak squad, IMO, and letting Gilmour leave will only make it weaker.

I'm not sure i agree that our squad is weak as such, unless you just mean inexperienced. Unfortunately this is something we have to take a chance with, alongside most teams in superleague over the next few years with the rule changes. I think we have made a good headstart in that respect over most others.

Freeing cap space is just the bonus.

When you look at the player who can play second row we have:

Wilkin
Clough
Puletua
Flannery
Dixon
Ashurst
Magennis?
Soliola

Gilmour is good, but i think easily replaceable. Ashurst, who IMO has been our best young player, should step up and replace Gilly long term with a starting back row next year of Wilkin, Flannery, Clough while intergrating Ashurst and Dixon occasionally.

On the opposite of your point, Why spend money on the cap when it isn't needed?

before the season started i was very worried about the depth of our squad, but the young'uns have come on better than we could've hoped and filled the void and are challenging the senior players for 1st team places, making them work harder, which is all good

Ooo good reply, touche sir! See this is the kind of debate we need more often on here!

TBH the only answer I personally can wholeheartedly give for retaining Gilmour in that respect is as someone else stated, his 'old head' experience and the loss of both his and several others were they all to leave at the end of this year.

As much as he brings on the pitch with his deceptive pace, line breaking and physical tackling abilities, he brings double with his big game experience, cool head, and knowledge of the game. Sometimes these are as valuable as the things being young and fresh can bring, if not more.

Not wanting to jump on everyone's bandwagon when they rib you about Matty Smith, but it is the things I mention above that made DA pick Longy in the 2007 GF and many people on hear agree with the decision. With the exception of perhaps Flannery and arguably Wilkin non of the back rowers you named have as much of these things as Gilly and that would be a big loss.

I did mean in terms of inexperience. If one or two of the starting 17 get injured leading up to a big game, i feel we would struggle to win the game as we would have to put a kid in. As you say, hopefully this will give us a head start for the future, but if as is been said, we have cap space available, then why not keep Gilmour and bring in a few players that will give us more strength in depth and it would also allow us to us the kids a bit more wisely rather than be forced to use them, when we may not want to.

Because it is there to be used, and if we can afford to use it then why not have the extra option of Gilmour to give us more depth in the squad.

Soliola will play at Centre, Puletua will play at prop because we're short at prop as it is. Unless we sign a couple of props (and there isn't alot available) then Puletua will feature there.

Wilkin, Clough and Flannery would first choice by your reckoning. After that it's youngsters. Whilst, we need to give youngsters a chance, Gilmour offers great experience, quality and utility value to the squad. That is a vital commodity in any team. He will aid the development of the younger players not hinder it.

If you look at it in another perspective where would you place Gilmour in that list as a true back rower, at worst I,ve got him placed 3rd, so why let him go.......or is it an ageist thing.

Indeed, he's in a position where the youngsters will get gametime at some point due to injuries and the like. He's not blocking their progress in the way Long, for example, would be.

Indeed Sia will play centre but he could play at second row if needed. Likewise Tony P, unless i'm mistaken he already spells there anyway.

I'd go with:

Wilkin
Flannery
Clough

Gilmour for me is the 4th best that we have but from what i've seen i'm a big fan of Ashurst and think he should play a lot more next year, coming off the bench.

I agree that he has a hell of a lot of experience that would be useful and if we gave him another contract so long as it is only one year, i wouldn't have any problems at all.

The cap saved could be used on improving contracts and/or signing a prop.

just because the cap is set at a particular level doesnt mean we have to spend right up to it:

1) we might not have the cash to spend the full amount
2) we have been caught out in the past with unexpected bonus payments which have taken us over the top
3) we should always retain some space for contingengy cover, or in case we get the opportunity to bring a "star" in. If someone like Darren Lockyer made himself available for a couple of months at the end of the year, I would expect Saints to be in the running for him - and to do that we would need some salary cap space. Likewise, if we lost Graham, Hargreaves and Fa'asavalu to long term injury now - we would need to bring in another prop from somewhere, so need some cap space for that.

Gilmour third or at worst fourth. I agree Ashurst has been good this year and for the future we must ensure he, and others, aren't kept waiting so long that they become disgruntled.

But in the here and now, Gilmour is a lot better than any of the youngsters on that list. If we can afford him, we should ensure he stays.

I suppose the other argument is that Gilmour has in fact been playing centre for a lot of the season and with the signing of Soliola and the retention of Gidley he has already been replaced.

I do think Gilmour is a quality player but he covers a number of areas where we have a lot of young talent at the moment. I think that Dixon and Ashurst both look like they are ready to play more games next season while Wheeler and Dean can cover quite well at centre.

On the other hand what is our salary cap situation? We are 80k under (reported amount we had to one side for Carvell) this season and Long and maybe even Cayless and KC going out.

At the moment we only have Soliola and the 3 young players improved contracts to increase our out goings. We may not need to release Gilmour on the basis of the salary cap as we may have enough room for him anyway.

So incase you had not worked it out yet i am pretty spilt over this.