Hardly an exclusive club though is it?

In your honest opinion, how better did the players produced at other clubs (ie Bradford, St.Helens, Hull) fare compared to the Wigan and Leeds lads?

21 players out of a squad of 32 will have come through the champions academy system next year.

It seems every thread I read now it ends up with a Wigan fan posting their starting line up and w@nking over the strength in depth

Manu and Berrigan both class as fed trained as was with us in 2008...bloody baffling rule if you ask me....we also have a Quota spot available and are looking at Grant Rovelli,which will take us to 7....still too many for liking but not as bad as some others who if they put their 1st 13 out will be overseas players from 6-13....meaning 4 pivot roles taken up by Aussies.

I like how you scrape the barrel by calling a one cap guy an "international", or listing that they were Australian schoolboys. Or that they even won a gf.

Fact is, none of those players are of the required quality we should be bringing into SL. An absolute joke.

Clinton, Dobson, Mason, Newton and Webster would all get into Saints first team, so I'm not sure how you can say that.

There are undoubtedly too many, but they are not bad players.

Our under 18's were in the top tier this season just gone and hopefully will go on to fullfill the potential that they showed. Its a start and shows that we are attempting to produce our own, including some getting full time contracts for this year. Our under 20's wasn't good enough but 4 or 5 years ago when the majority were recruited we were newly promoted and fighting for super league survival, the closed shop allowing us to put long term plans in place.

Webster - International, GF winner
Clinton - International, GFinalist
Vella - SOO, International, Gfinalist
Dobson - Australian schoolboy, AG medal winner
Mason - SOO, International, GF winner
Newton - GF winner
Galea - Australian schoolboy, GF winner
Lovegrove
Fisher
Green - Australian schoolboy

As the opening post stated that the Giants overseas players were 'kiwi' I believe that JB put the descriptions down as a result. He also missed Lovegrove who was Aussie schoolboy international

and has been here since he was 18. Dobson was in this years dream team, Newton and Galea the year before. Vella has been the cornerstone of our pack throughout our time in super league whilst Fisher has been with the club since 2006 and will probably leave at the end of his current contract. The likes of Vella, Newton and Clinton are good for the young lads to learn off and would get in the majority of super league teams.

Thanks for your concern though

Jealous.

Indeed. How times change eh?

arent you only allowed 25 players in your first team squad?

Because it seemed bizarre that even despite (if your stats are correct) Tuson playing more than all but one of the players you listed here, you still manage to climb on your high horse and preach about a young English Wigan player that is getting more games than 8 out of 9 young English players at Leeds.

you really are getting desperate arent you Bill

No, you're making it easier and easier

Nah, I thought it was just that the top 25 earners count under the salary cap, the rest aren't included in it (which means that any youngsters promoted on a small salary aren't on the cap, which is a good thing imo).
That's my understanding of it, I may be wrong though, can anyone confirm?

You're right.

I'm pretty sure most clubs could say that more than 20 of their 'top' 32 players are English. We also hear every year about how clubs have 'players coming through' who 'aren't quite ready'. Odd then how foten that an overseas player is signed for two or three years to enable a 20-year old (who to be frank if a back should be either in the first team or elesewhere) to somehow develop.

Using Wigan (or Leeds) as an example, how many overseas players are in the strongest 17? I suspect all Wigan's overseas players are in the 17. So the real proportion is 7 (or however many overseas players you have) out of 17. With Leeds its currently 6 (or however many we have) out of 17. That's over a third of both sides ineligible to play for England.

The quality issue is real as well. Quite seriously, trying to defend half the KR group named on the basis of quality is ridiculous. At Leeds I'd say we shouldn't have Cross or Delaney. From all accounts we're going to sign one more. How anyone can defend these sorts of numbers and quality of players is quite beyond me.

so why reply to a post that says



by ignoring it and saying

Exactly right

I see wakey posters have a thread naming a starting 17 for 2011. They have 9 or 10 non fed trained players. 12 years in SL and still over half the team comes from overseas and many of the players would not get in NRL squads never mind win Oz / Kiwi / SOO caps. How long do the board and j Kear need to put this right?

After 5 pages we finally get to the reason why the thread was started.

Wrong!

I am proud that the Giants have a low number of overseas players and that they are quality players not journeymen on 'exemptions'.

I think the number at HKR is poor and if they have 10 or so overseas players when they have been in SL 12 years I think it will be appalling.

For a club that has been in SL 12 years and in a RL heartland it is very disappointing that much of your starting line up will include the likes of Obst / Henderson / Leanno and a broken Motu Tony. How long do JK and Ted need to put it right?

For whats its worth, Leaeno won't be here next season, but you'll find my thoughts on the number of overseas players at Trinity on that forum. I even put a comparison team which had just 4 overseas players in the 17 against one that included all of them, and IMO the team compromising of mostly Brits wouldn't have done much worse than the one filled up on imports (see Ben Jeffries thread).

We're all going to go round in circles here about the legitimacy of Overseas players and who is good enough and who isn't, how many youngsters each club has got etc...

I'm assuming the thread has been started to look at the number of Overseas players in the league and the effect that has had on the national teams success. If that is the case then it would seem most appropiate to look at the national teams problem positions and then compare where the Overseas players play.

If we look at the backs in general as a problem and then take the starting line ups for the top four sides this year in those positions then surely we find where we are going wrong.

Wigan

1. Tomkins
2. Roberts (Overseas)
3. Gleeson (Coming to the end of his career)
4. Carmont (Overseas)
5. Richards (Overseas)
6. Finch (Overseas)
7. Deacon (Coming to the end of his career)

St Helens

1. Wellens (Coming to the end of his career)
2. Gardner? (Coming to the end of his career bearing in mind he's a winger)
3. Gidley (Overseas)
4. Soliola (Overseas, and I've picked him there because of his shirt number)
5. Meli (Overseas)
6. Pryce (Coming to the end of his career at 29)
7. Eastmond

Warrington

1. Hodgson (Overseas)
2. Riley
3. King (Overseas)
4. Bridge
5. Hicks (Overseas)
6. Briers (Coming to the end of his career)
7. Myler/Monaghan (Overseas)

Leeds

1. Webb (Overseas)
2. Smith
3. Delaney (Overseas)
4. Senior (Coming to the end of his career)
5. Hall
6. McGuire
7. Burrow

So I'm sure you'll argue with my selections and alot of you will know better about who will be starting for your club come February but it doesn't look pretty does it.

9/28 Are possible International players of age still. I've been harsh with the 'coming to the end of their career' because that's the bottom line. They are either past it/tried internationally and they haven't been good enough. I could add McGuire and Burrow to the tried and not good enough pile by I've decided to let them off.

Wigan, Saints and Leeds to an extent have youngsters coming through who will hopefully push into starting spots in the next couple of years but at the end of the day if you are good enough you are old enough.

Just look at the NRL, look at the age of which youngsters are blooded and look how they've performed. We've got to improve levels of coaching and training, rather than rely on our youngsters learning from seasoned overseas players who in reality weren't good enough to stay in the NRL and were pushed out by a better youngster.

Sorry I've realised that I've missed Shenton out. Fair to Saints, but the point still stands.