Less than half of the 2004 Grand Final winning side are still at Leeds, so it's a little misleading to suggest there has been "little player turnover" in recent years. That doesn't include those players who have been and gone again in the meantime such as Ellis and Mark O'Neill for example.

The bulk of new players who have cemented a place in the Leeds first choice 17 since 2004/5 have not been products from the Academy, they have either been recruits from overseas - e.g. Eastwood, Webb, Donald, Buderus - or acquisitions from other clubs - e.g. Peacock, Ellis, Kirke.

Over that 5-6 year span only Hall, Smith (before his departure to Union) and Ablett have cracked the first choice 17. While Leeds should be congratulated for being at the spearhead of developing and promoting young British talent in the early part of the century (and that level of development was freakish and sustainble), it's difficult to argue that the flow of players up from the junior ranks to plug the gaps when others leave hasn't stalled.

At least 7 remain, most of whom were Academy products. That's not bad going. I'd venture it's far better than most if not all other clubs in the league.

Why ignore SInfield, Burrow, McGuire, Hall, Bailey, JJB, Ablett, Diskin, Smith all of whom have cemented places and all of whom are Academy products.

How many games has Clarkson played? What constitutes cracking the first choice 17? Isn't the first choice 17 the 17 fit to play each week which often contains many other Academy products?

No it isn't, it's easy to argue. The argument being that there hasn't been the same necessity or opportunity because the team has been built around the crop that was produced prior to 2003.

Clarkson is definately 1st team material IMO, proven by the fact he kept his place in the 17 when Ablett, JJB & Lauiti'iti were all available

There's still the likes of Clarkson,Burgess,Watkins and Bjb that are around and imo will make the step up.
Plus we've also handed opportunities to the likes of Gibson ,Scruton,Ratu and Worrall who have all moved on.
I don't think it's as bad as you claim mate of course it would be nice to have 1-13 of homegrown quality players but i doubt that will ever happen and we still have a core of very good acadamy products within our 1st team squad.

If my calculations are correct, in 5 years leeds will fail to qualify for the playoffs. We'll win one more grand final between now and then.

Sinfield and mcguire are irreplaceable and when they retire or leave we'll go downhill rapidly.

how the hell can you calculate a thing like that?

Sorry but that's ridiculous.....in 5 years anything could happen with regards to a new kid somewhere coming through.

By heck, you may all mock but he's right you know, see - 6.02 x 10 to the power 23 = finishing 9th in 2015

With the signings of Ambler, Pitts and Amor I thought Leeds (and Bluey in particular) were saying that the junior forwards coming through weren't up to it? Hardly a ringing endorsement of the state of junior development at the club.

Junior development shouldn't be treated as a tap that can be turned on when required. Just because we have McGuire and Burrow for example doesn't mean we should stop looking for the next big thing at halfback. All players are one injury away from the end of their career. I also don't buy the idea that you can have too many good juniors.

TBH this whole area is one of the key reasons we're way behind the Aussies. Every year every NRL club will have 2 or 3 juniors coming through who are capable of making first grade on a regular basis (not all world beaters but good players). This is one of the factors enables them to survive the fact that so many NRL regulars end up in England.

But there are far fewer juniors over here in comparison to Australia so fewer will come through.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Even with the best academy set up the most 1st teamers a club can hope to expect to get from the academy each year is one or two. Any more is a once in a decade or more occurance. Leeds glut of kids comign through in 2001/3 was a golden generation for you guys. Now other clubs are switched on in junior development it'll be much harder to get those numbers.

It will certainly make it harder to attract juniors from outside the immediate catchment/Service Area due to increased competition.

Of that golden generation you mentioned however, the majority are from within the Leeds Service Area. Maybe the amateur clubs in Leeds just aren't finding/producing kids of a required standard to feed up through the Service Area route and into the junior age groups?

thats what people need to understand, the 2001 generation was a freak and we should be compared to that generation. Also there simply isnt the opportunity to blood all those players at once like we did back then, mainly because we didnt win anything during the 'blooding' years, and we werent particularly good for a while whilst those youngsters got up to speed. There is no real point in us not aiming for success now with a team proven to be able to do it in favour of aiming for it in 3 years with players who have yet to prove their quality.

2001 generation was the building of the foundations, now we dont need to build those foundations, they are already there, if we can bring through 2 or 3 top class players every 2 or 3 years then we will be doing fine, and thats what we seem to be doing with Hall Ablett Burgess and Smith, now we are bringing through Clarkson, Watkins and BJB, and adding young british players when we need like Pitts and Ambler etc. This is exactly what we should be doing, what all clubs should be doing.

Diskin, Sinfield and Burrow aren't.

More clubs are pulling out the stops to attract the top young players now. Whereas 10 years ago there will have been only a couple of clubs switched on nowadays rule changes like the home grown rule means that clubs have to look at junior recruitment and I doubt any club is going to be able to stockpile the best young players.

To give an idea of the level of competition the Bulls recently signed a highly rated young backrower from Dudley Hill. A certain club over the hill were offering a 10k signing on fee & car on top of a lucrative contract. All the other SL clubs were interested too. It just shows how much clubs attention has turned to junior development.

I think the days of "golden generations" are going to be rarer and rarer.

Don't be silly. This can't be the case. It MUST be Hetherington failing to live up to the standards of 2000-2003 in relation to junior development.

Someone HAS TO be doing something wrong at Headingley. After all, if they weren't, it would mean the fans posting on here maybe didn't know better than the people running the club.

To me, that information doesn't suggest that "golden generations" are going to get rarer. Instead, it suggests that the next golden generation is going to be at whichever club has spent the most money signing up the kids everyone else wants.

It's irrelevant anyway. Leeds having a number of youngsters coming into the team at the same time was not lucky, and nor was it a once in a lifetime. It was completely planned, and is achievable by any club if they set their goals out to do that. Leeds did exactly that as they needed to do it that way due to a shortage of money at the time.

Leeds identified the youngsters they wanted and most were from the local catchment, then they developed them under a plan to introduce quickly into first team rugby. They furuther supplemented that with a number of high profile quality "older heads". That's why they were so successfull with it.

Brisbane Rhino makes the sensible suggestion above about what they do in the NRL, which is plan full stop to promote 2 or 3 every year, regardless of who has the jerseys in the first team. Take the example at our club expressed by certain fans that we don't need to concentrate on developing an half back because we already have two good ones. That is an example of slackening off on what was done previously.

There is far more quality youngsters around now thant there was 10 years ago, but the key is to plan to use them, not leave them on a whim to hope. Because of the part time nature of academy rugby now (compared to a lot full time 10 years ago) players take the option of getting a job and doing championship rugby, rather than waiting and just hoping with Super League.

How have you made the leap from opinions expressed by certain fans to being what the club are actually doing?

Do you genuinely believe the club are not actively looking for and preparing the next Burrow and or McGuire?

There's been a lot of criticism about the Rhinos junior development. Those that have defended it have given specific examples of players who have come through and rationalised reasons why they haven't come through, or needed to come through, at the same rate as they did between 2000 and 2003.

The critical posters haven't justified their criticisms at all. I am still waiting for David to explain what Barrie Mac is doing so badly that he describes his appointment as a joke. I'd genuinely be interested to understand why he feels that way.

Yes



I do. Let's put it this way, as someone who was working with juniors before, I can tell you that Gareth Moore was a better player than Burrow was at the same stage. The club had no choice but to give Burrow the go when they did, as the plan was for him to be the scrum half anyway. But they did not have that same will when it came to the next generation, i.e. Moore. I am not saying he would have eclipsed what Burrow has done, but just that he was better at the same stage, so who knows.

Similarly, McGuire was not the best stand off around when we got him, certainly Bridge was a more sought after youngster at the time. But we developed McGuire with the same plan for him to be the stand off, and look what we got.



I've not seen those rationalised reasons. Usually it's just a case of defending the club and harping back to what we achieved previously, because we had such a good success. But that is no reason why it can't be repeated.




I think it's been justified many times, and indeed the clubs took action it's self this year for reasons which were part of those very criticisms.

Barrie Mac is a bit of a joke for the position he is in. I can't speak for David, but perhaps it has somethign to do with just getting the job without any relevant experience, without any relevant abilities over others, and the fact that his priorities are over and above anything else his Sky media role.

Gotcha, it looks to me from what you have written that the club have been actively seeking the next Burrow/McGuire. Clearly they signed and worked with Moore (and a few others).

I think the only way your argument would hold any water is if there was a young scrum half or stand off playing for our rivals that was on our books and release or that we refused the opportunity to sign, who is better than Burrow and or McGuire. I can't think of any, can you? What is Moore doing since Leeds released him?

Bridge is a bad example. he was released by the Bulls for reasons of his own making and since being offered a lifeline by Warrington it has not been as a half back.

But do you, or David, or anyone, know what he doing in his role, what he is doing so badly, and what he should be doing?

I'm saying, had they had the same will that they had 10 years ago, we would already have had that replacement IMO. I feel strongly that what we got 10 years ago was not luck, and not one in a lifetime, it was planned.




I don't see what the relevance is to playing for another super league club? I'm saying there is youngsters there, just like identified 10 years ago, who 10 years ago were given a carrott that the position was theres subject to achieving their planned development. The club has not done the same since, hence why players have left and found it better to get full time jobs and play rugby part time, rather than have part time rugby contracts.

I am confident that had we repeated what we were doing on a cotinuous basis that we would have continued to produce many more players in that time. Whether we would have needed them is still irrelevant, because we would not know what opportunities we could have had without doing it.




Bridge was only an example of that he was actually a more sought after player than McGuire a young age. But Leeds developed McGuire and look what they got. You don't necessarily have to be the best youngster around at that stage, it was the clubs development that took him to the next level.




Like I said I can't speak for David. But In my honest opinion, McDermott appears to prioritise his media duties over and above his Leeds role, and comes across as though that is what he want's to do. I strongly believe there is quite a few better qualified and who would put more energy into the role out there.

Gotcha if there are the "quality" of youngsters there that we are missing or not developing surely another club would snap them up?
iirc Mcgure was identified very early ala Sinfield as "elite" youngsters that could make the step up sooner rather than later and whilst i agree the club nurtured that talent ,to imply that Mcguire was'nt the best 6 around at that time in his age group is way off imo.
I watched him and likes of Mathers ,Burrow ,Walker ,Calderwood and a very young Richard Moore to name a few rip their respective age groups apart with ease and it was clear they were very "special" in their own right before the club started the obvious process to turn them pro.
I don't think you can replicate that golden generation as easily as you imply and if the "talent" is there as you say why do they get jobs and play in the championship rather than other clubs signing them?
Now i'm not saying everything is rosy as the last u20 season can prove but i don't think that the acadamy system has been as negleted as you imply either.

Moore was young player of the year in the championship this year and sometimes you need to take a step back, play in a tougher competition than academy and against men, and then come back stronger and appears to have done that breaking a number of points records along the way as well as being key to their first trophy in a million years or so for Batley in the Northern Rail cup win.
There are far more less talented players that appeared for Leeds than him, and I think that was more down to playing in a key pivotal position for a club where there was great pressure and expectations to win things in his time at Leeds. I am sure that if he was at a Wakey or Cas etc where no such expectations existed, he would have definately been given a shot.
I think being overlooked when Burrow or McGuire were out (not often) probably made his mind up to move on.
Maybe one day when he may come back and bite us on the !

I have very high hopes for some of our Academy players, even though as a club we are not dominating the respective competitions at present

IMO it will be interesting to note how many of the Saints/Wigan juniors go onto future stardom at their clubs in the future, afterall they are clearly the clubs to match domestically speaking!

But have the Rhino's not trodden this path before?
How many players have we had to subsequently move onto other SL/NL clubs because their was no available pathway to the first team squad?

When a side is successful like the Rhinos are/have been for a number of seasons, then 1/2 players moving up to SL level each season is a success IMO, if a club produces too many and all at once in the same season, then they are clearly faced with a predicament under the salary cap era, do you promote them all and at the expense of the established players, or do you have to move some on?

I have been very impressed by Stevie Ward who only signed on late into the season, Colton Roche, Daniel Smith and Brad Singleton all looked very capable of progressing, but only time will tell

I wonder how much the switch to summer has impacted on young players coming into the game at professional clubs?

In the pre-SL era, if you were a 16 year old going to a professional club for the first time you would be sitting your exams in the summer then getting straight on with pre-season training.

As a 16 year old (or equally an 18 year old taking A Levels) these days, you could be joining up with the Academy of a SL club then right in the middle of the season be taking exams which could potentially shape your future prospects if pro sport doesn't work out.