Quote ="hally's hot air"Very true but we all know this ain't an normal rugby league club! it's quite obvious the blame will be swept under the carpet and carl will continue to pick up his wage up whilst filling us with spin and lies! without sounding like a broke record we are well and truly a broken club'"
Perhaps you would like to specify the spin and lies which you accuse Carl of filling us with.
I offer no apology for once again pointing out that without Carl's efforts this forum would not exist because there would not be a club to attach it to. It was also through his efforts and contacts that sufficient local backing was made available to run the club. He also gathered together a group of reasonable standard players prepared to operate on a match fee basis to enable us to field a team each week.
I am not a fan of Dual Registration as I have said before but as long as it exists we should take full advantage of it. Under it we are linked with a good Super League club giving us access to good quality young players, at a key stage of their development, who otherwise we would not be able to persuade to come here. One penalty associated with that is that we cannot always be certain of their availability but when they are available, and on the whole they have been, they provide us with a superior class of player to what we have normally in our ranks. (The two, other than Miloudi, who played in Toronto were unknown to me but performed well.)
Whether we are among the 5 best teams in this league is a moot point not helped by the distortion caused by the imposition of Toronto on us. If we are to compete for 2 promotion places then it has to be on a reasonably level playing field and that has not been the case in the last 2 seasons. As for being in the top 2 teams on its day in a play-off competition any team can beat any other team. It does not need me to point out, I hope, how close we came to making the play-offs.
We now must look forward. My impression so far is that Richard Horne knows what he is about and must be given time to get the team moving in the right direction. Among his first jobs will be sorting out indiscipline which has been our main problem. It should not be too difficult for professional rugby league players to maintain their discipline and it is up to others on the field to point out their errors to the miscreants. However the coach must be expected to lay down the law on this.
No doubt there will be some in and outs among the squad but we have the basis there to build on. I have said before that it is not the quality of individual players we need to consider but how they operate together to form a team. It is a fine ideal to aim at a squad that would perform creditably in the Championship but I don't think that is realistic. If the coach has the personality to attract such a player all well and good. Otherwise we need squad capable of succeeding in League 1.
The present squad must have been encouraged by the performance in Toronto when everything was weighted against them. That is something to build on.
