rover 2000 wrote:
miloudi hardly a kid at 25 although he does still get the odd backhander off radders for losing his ball
I suppose when these players are all in together of course they will find it hard against the likes of saints ,
this is what happens when you load up the top end of your salary cap and they get injured you cant have it both ways .
See this is where I think F.C (and some other S.L teams) are coming unstuck. It was O.K for F.C to sign the likes of Kearney, Swain, Berrigan, Fitzgibbon, Sing, Blacklock and other oversees players who played 20+ caps for Australia because they were able to supplement the squad with GENUINE quality academy players who were on relative peanuts compared to the above mentioned (according to Josh Hodgson's recent article), players like Yeaman, Houghton, Washbrook, Cooke, Rich and Graeme Horne, Scott Wheeldon, Paul King etc.
If you compare to todays F.C squad list, barring Shaul (who is 26 now so not a youth) the gulf in difference is huge, they have nowhere near the quality to suppliment the huge earners in the squad.
Rovers had a lot of caching up to do from promotion in 2007, and i think we have more or less caught up with the majority of Super League in creating a conveyor belt for kids. We still need more in my opinion, but from what my 15 year old neigbour tells me Castleford are signing the cream of the crop in the East Riding district.