: Fri May 22, 2009 1:41 am  

widneslardboy wrote:

Not a chance Grady will be bak at centre I wouldnt have thought.

The club have firmly nailed their colours to the mast by consistently playing him in the backrow for the reserves so I cant see him shifting back to centre for the first time in a while and stepping up to first team level.

Shame for Shane really because I think the changes in deciding his best position have held him back slightly over the last few years.

Hartley at centre or possibly Dean Thompson as an outside bet to make his debut. Maybe bit too early again.

Whats the general opinion on Dean Thompson? Is he close to the 1st team? Also Gregg Scott is a VERY good player who's been at fullback recently but could see him being a great centre in a few years. Anyone who watches the reserves have any opinions as they are two talented young lads.

: Fri May 22, 2009 2:54 pm  

Nozzy wrote:

Whats the general opinion on Dean Thompson? Is he close to the 1st team? Also Gregg Scott is a VERY good player who's been at fullback recently but could see him being a great centre in a few years. Anyone who watches the reserves have any opinions as they are two talented young lads.

I like Dean Thompson. Pretty sure he joined us part way through a season at U 18's and he played a lot of games off the bench coming on in the back row. Seemed a strong lad then and he is notching up the tries for the reserves as well as being the current reserve player of the month.

He has done well at reserves but id like to see him go out to an NL2 club on loan and get some gametime there and hopefully see him maintain his performances as for me the standard of the reserve league is quite misleading. Given the injuries the reserves and 18's have at the moment I dodnt think he'll be going anywhere at present but he needs a loan spell elsewhere before he is even contemplated for the firsts.

Gregg Scott I have only seen a couple of times at FB this year after he played alot of his games for the 18's last year on the wing. Seems a decent lad but I think the movement back and forth between 18's and reserves isnt really letting him settle in one side and position.

: Fri May 22, 2009 3:14 pm  

vikings 4 ever wrote:

1st thing McCormack did was ship all of the youth players out on loan. Year after year players could have come through but the likes of Nash, Alcock, Bruce Johnson, Draper, Bowman, Keaveny, Donoghue, Sidlow were continually ignored and shipped out.

To show how far McCormack ignored the youth players, despite starting last year with loads of youngsters in the team, by the time we played Celtic away, we didn't have one home grown player in the squad and even Celtic had 1 or 2. Sure fire way to show we didn't deserve a licence being beaten for youth development by a side who were less then 3 years old and had the reputation for being a team full of Aussies - to make matter worse we were well beaten and it was on Sky - just how bad were we trying to make ourselves look?

I dont think Steve Mc did at all bad with the young players in the academy & reserves. He certainly gave more debuts to young players than any other Widnes coach has in a long long time and he was under a hell of a lot of pressure to succeed and gain promotion over those years which is never going to be a time in a coaches mind to blood all your young players.

I dont think it was ever a case of ignoring young players but some of them werent ready to step up to first team and play at that level consistently over the course of the season. Sadly, as I put on the previous post the fact that the standard of the reserve league is so deceiving didnt and still doesnt help either when judging the credentials of a young player.

The loan deals caught some of the young players out in all honesty so I suppose they served their purpose in that respect. Probably the biggest example for me would be Adam Bowman who should be a regular in the centres now given his previous form at reserves. He was a very very good centre at that level and outside of Richie Myler & Adam Sidlow would have been the player I fancied to crack first team rugby and become a mainstay in the side. As it was successive loan spells at Swinton didnt go too well and I dont think we ever saw a fully focused and confident player return to the club.

Just to pick up on your Celtic game point. In the first game where we went down 50-18 in May, 3 players played who came through the full system at Widnes, those being Grady, Donoghue & Draper. That was compared to the Crusaders 0.

In the league game in June, Ben Flower did play for Celtic and Widnes didnt field any players who had come through their system although Dean, Kavanagh, Crookes, Roper & Tyrer where all U'21 players.

: Sat May 23, 2009 9:37 pm  

Doc Holliday wrote:

I'm not so sure mate. He gave Dayne Donoghue a chance, and Dayne Donoghue, for a 19 year old, was starting to look a good prospect. Unfortunately, the deal he and others were offered was considerably less than they would have been able to get working at a normal job. That wasn't down to McCormack who, I hear, was all for keeping Donoghue.

I cant remember now but didnt Dayne go to Saints or was it Dale Bloomfield? sorry it seems ages ago.

: Sat May 23, 2009 9:40 pm  

Mum wrote:

I cant remember now but didnt Dayne go to Saints or was it Dale Bloomfield? sorry it seems ages ago.

Must have been Bloomfield as Dayne was out the game for a while before being snapped up by Rochdale who he is still now playing for.

: Sat May 23, 2009 9:46 pm  

-VIKINGMAN- wrote:

Must have been Bloomfield as Dayne was out the game for a while before being snapped up by Rochdale who he is still now playing for.

Thank you, nice lad Dayne glad he is still playing his rugby.