Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 1:02 pm  

Bullseye wrote:

I rate Keyes too.

I expect the coaching staff at the club keep stats on other players in the division. The academy do it for all youth players and all the players in the Bradford service area at different community clubs.

I do like Keyes, just needs to work on his kicking game, especially his kick offs. But still, a good little player we've got.

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 1:07 pm  

So, lets assume for a moment that ChaLo do actually half an idea about what they're doing, remembering that Lowe is the only ever non-aussie to coach an origin side, and has probably forgotten more about rugby league than I'll ever know - he's also now 70 years old, so could probably be do something else in his dotage....

Now if you'd just taken on a club that was on -12 points and almost certain to be relegated and lose half of its hard core support if you don't spend some money on experience in the pack in particular (Lowe and Toovey must surely have some idea what a good rugby league side looks like), then faced with relegation as a very serious threat - why would you 'choose' to continue spending money on a youth set up you're not obliged to run?

Surely you'd promote the young players who looked like making it to the 1st team, scrap the academy and spend what money you saved, have to invest and/or can generate off the field in the short term on a team, decent enough to keep you up for a season or two at least and until some stability returns to the whole organisation and slowly reintroduce the off field structures you'd sacrificed with future investment?

Or you know there's no danger of relegation and you slowly invest in the off-field structures and youth set up as they're the foundations for the longer term and a first team that's in a different competition that generates more income.....

The optimist in me has to believe there's more at play here and the lack of transparency is for a very good reason.

If there isn't then the behaviour of our new ownership is at worst disgraceful and disingenuous and at best just downright incompetent. Surely even they don't think it's right to watch boys get smashed by men every week.

Here's hoping the optimist in me is right

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 1:12 pm  

Keyes would go pretty well behind a decent pack, he marshalls what pack he does well enough.

Would like to see him take the line on a bit more and pass left now and then - all very fixable as he looks like he has a brain in his noggin and will learn.

He is still very, very young for a scrum half and can only improve

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 1:41 pm  

Frank Whitcombe wrote:

So, lets assume for a moment that ChaLo do actually half an idea about what they're doing, remembering that Lowe is the only ever non-aussie to coach an origin side, and has probably forgotten more about rugby league than I'll ever know - he's also now 70 years old, so could probably be do something else in his dotage....

Now if you'd just taken on a club that was on -12 points and almost certain to be relegated and lose half of its hard core support if you don't spend some money on experience in the pack in particular (Lowe and Toovey must surely have some idea what a good rugby league side looks like), then faced with relegation as a very serious threat - why would you 'choose' to continue spending money on a youth set up you're not obliged to run?

Surely you'd promote the young players who looked like making it to the 1st team, scrap the academy and spend what money you saved, have to invest and/or can generate off the field in the short term on a team, decent enough to keep you up for a season or two at least and until some stability returns to the whole organisation and slowly reintroduce the off field structures you'd sacrificed with future investment?

Or you know there's no danger of relegation and you slowly invest in the off-field structures and youth set up as they're the foundations for the longer term and a first team that's in a different competition that generates more income.....

The optimist in me has to believe there's more at play here and the lack of transparency is for a very good reason.

If there isn't then the behaviour of our new ownership is at worst disgraceful and disingenuous and at best just downright incompetent. Surely even they don't think it's right to watch boys get smashed by men every week.

Here's hoping the optimist in me is right

The pessimist in me says that having the youth setup would be a caveat of ChaLo getting this bizarre deal to run the Bulls. After all, look at how many of the current England team came through it!

And it seems to be providing cannon fodder for our on-field opponents too at the moment.

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 1:44 pm  

Fr13daY wrote:

The pessimist in me says that having the youth setup would be a caveat of ChaLo getting this bizarre deal to run the Bulls. After all, look at how many of the current England team came through it!

And it seems to be providing cannon fodder for our on-field opponents too at the moment.

Plus where would Huddersfield get their next up and coming players from if our academy didn't exist?

[Bullseye]

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 1:48 pm  

Keeping the youth setup going was one of the RFL conditions they imposed on anyone taking over. I’m sure that applied to phoenix clubs too or they wouldn’t get a license. I hope you’re right Frank, it would explain this season’s shambles. However so much has gone wrong it’s hard to be optimistic.

Whatever the situation going to matches isn’t an attractive prospect at the moment.

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Wed May 10, 2017 5:04 pm  

Well, I for one am getting sick of the pantomime.

IF there is some "thing" in the background whereby whatever we do this season doesn't really matter, then that would mean somebody else would be potentially prejudiced directly at our expense. I am going along with all this nonsense to date but if it transpired that without telling us
a) this season has been purely academic and a total waste of time and
b) we play anywhere else than where we deserve to be on merit in 2018
then that might just be a bridge too far for me.

It seems increasingly likely to me that Cha-Low are really just placemen, and the real owners of the club for all practical purposes are the RFL. I don't know why everything connected with the Bulls has to stink to high heaven, but that seems to be the way.

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Thu May 11, 2017 8:52 am  

Ferocious Aardvark wrote:

Well, I for one am getting sick of the pantomime.

Yeah, me too and I'm absolutely sick 'n tired of all the rumour and speculation.

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Thu May 11, 2017 9:05 am  

Old_Northern wrote:

Yeah, me too and I'm absolutely sick 'n tired of all the rumour and speculation.

You may be sick and tired of the rumour and speculation but that is all that is keeping people interested in the club at the moment. The rugby is the worse I've seen since I started watching in '66 and we aren't hearing anything from the club to maintain interest. The next step is apathy.

[Bullseye]

Re: Chalmers and Lowe the conspiracy : Thu May 11, 2017 10:47 am  

Spot on.

I've mixed feelings about the loan signings. I'm pleased in some ways as it stops us being cannon fodder but is it all just a false hope in the end. We have a mountain to climb.

Even if by some miracle we stay up we still have no idea what the forward plan is and I suspect neither do the owners.