I think it is obvious that the present Saints side is not good enough to win trophy's; I may be proved wrong but I doubt it. The question is; if you had the chance to have a clean sweep who would you keep out of the present squad.

Soliola
Lomax
Perry (If he keeps his recent form up)
Roby
McCarthy-Scarsbrook
Puletua
Wilkin
Laffranchi (As a back rower only)
Clough
Magennis
Dixon
Gaskell
Makinson
Foster

There the players I would keep who play for the side regularly week in week out. Youngsters beyond this I cant comment on as I havent seen enough of them to judge.

Makinson, Jones, Lomax, Gaskell, Roby, LMS, Puletua and Soliola. The rest are average and could easily be replaced.

Just mentioned this on another thread, only Soliola and Roby would be good enough in my team.

I hate threads like this, they always pop up after a defeat.


We know we aint good enough but the standard of super league has dropped that low that I think with Manu coming in and if we signed a prop and stand off we would be real threat to Warrington and Wigan.

Also a good coach will help, we've not had a proper coach for four years now!

But we're not going to sign a prop or a stand off are we?

Who would we replace them with? I don't think we are that far behind other teams player wise, we could do with a good prop and an experienced half back, but we have the players in the squad to be better than we are with a bit of shifting around.

A coach is a bigger priority for me.

We are suppose to be bringing in two new faces so maybe they are a prop and stand off.

I know... the kneejerk mood swing-o-meter just never ceases to amuse me every single time.



Bang on. We need a good coach to bring the best out of what we've got and put an actual game-plan together (jury's out on Brown yet), sign a #7, another prop and (in an ideal world) another 3/4 to be in a position to challenge on the same level as the Ws again. We could still challenge with the 3/4s we already have if Turner clicks (doubts again), Jones and Makinson kick on or Wheeler ever emerges from the deep depths of wherever the hell he's hiding. We have big holes that need filling but it's hardly the end of the world frankly.

We're going to finish top 4 despite the most inept tactical system I've ever seen a Saints team play and despite glaring and obvious deficiencies throughout the season. The rest of the league frankly sucks. Warrington may be a class apart but most of their key players are in the last few years of their careers now. Same goes for Leeds. Just look what Wigan have done with just a few real top quality players and some top coaching. All the predictable talk of doom and gloom and mass clearouts... For the love of mercy get a grip people. Even Hohaia could be a useful member of the squad if used right FFS.

I'll believe that when i see it.

Doomed! We're all doomed!
Without throwing the baby out with the bath water, and bearing in mind we're in a salary capped sport, i'd suggest the following

For the backs-
Sign a big winger and move Meli into the centre to replace shenton.
Sign an experienced half back who can organise play from 7 and, most importantly, can kick the ball. Ship Hohaia to make room - I'm sure, given the salary cap situation in Aus, there's a club that match his wages with us. I'm sure I've heard names like Hornby and Prince banded about as available.
If we do the above and assume Ade Gardner can start playing again, then we will potentially have Lomax, Gaskell, Makinson, Wheeler and Swift to fill the #1 and #6 shirt.
Wellens to leave. Whilst he's playing ok at the moment - certainly scoring tries, he in many ways embodies our predicament; good enough to see of the mediocre competetion easily, but now inneffective against the elite.

For the forwards-
Move Laffranchi to 13 and ship out Wilkin. Whilst I have a lot of repect for his contribution and I know he has a lot of abilities, his utilty value not only dilutes his own game because of the way we use him, but it compunds the problem that we lack bite and forward direction. You may also be able to get a few quid for him.
A starting pack of Perry, Roby, Puletua, Sia, Manu and Boof is massive.
Next, sign one more forward who is HARD, someone who has big balls and likes to get amongst the oppo. Someone who, the harder you hit him, the harder he runs the next time - like Fozzy used to do for us, like westwood does for wire. Someone who comes of the bench and makes the opposition crowd/team think "Oh Bugger!" and the home crowd/team think "Here we go!"

We're not far off, assuming we get some good coaching. Players like McCarthey and Grix are far from world beaters, but they played their part in shalacking us t'other day, because the Wire squad is playing well as a whole. We get that and do the above things I suggest, then we'll be a real threat to the title.

Wigan brought in a coach and a fairly old, decent, but not earth moving half back and went from also rans to top of the league.

There are failings which have been brought about in our team, mainly through competition from outside of SL. That great prop went to the NRL, we could not compete, that decent halfback should have been Eastmond who went to union. He would have been in his 4th or 5th year by now and getting into his own stride. These things could not be prevented, we could have replaced but whether we would have ever got equal quality is debatable. The prop we missed out on last year (GRiffin) has hardly been of La Franki quality for Leeds, never mind a Graham replacement.

Halfback wise I just think from our first contract talks with Eastmond we did it all the wrong way round letting Long and Smith go, before getting Eastmond to sign, this allowed Eastmond and his agent the upper hand in contact talks, if we had not told Long so early he was not required, then when Eastmond asked for 2 years rather than 3 or 4, we could have said no thanks and let him go to union then and have brought Lomax on with Long at that point, or smith.

But we are were we are and it's not disaster, alot will depend on how brown changes players attitudes, can he get our wingers to be better under the high ball, will he mix it up a bit at FB with Lance and Wellens, will he get a new prop, will he get another halfback or can he develop Gaskell to iron out those parts of his game that are keeping him out the team.

Whats happened to Wheeler by the way, he was supposed to be our Tommy Martyn replacement by now, surely he isn,t afull time injurist.
Same for Swift looked promising, fast and elusive, whats happened to him.
Big concern is we can,t develop our young promising players in the same manner of Wigan, Warrington and Leeds.
Lomax, Gaskell and Makinson have flattened out in performance, they should be star players and a constant threat but they are not. Is this very bad coaching or have we lost that winning structure and culture in what is a poor standard of superleague.

Me too, sadly. Can hardly remember a player ever signing for Saints when everyone hasn't been talking about them for months already (Turner and Manu being the latest example.)

It's August now so if we were in for 2 more players I'd expect to have heard some names linked by now. But it's all gone quiet.

Get rid of them all...3rd in table and losing 4 games since March is not acceptable in my book whatsoever!!

Why not sign up all the Bradford players who are available as they are obviously better than what we have and see where that gets us?

Whilst I agree we could do with 1 or 2 more players, why sign people just for the sake of it. A player must be available in order for us to sign them. Instead of just saying "a prop" or "a stand off", look at players that are available and we would have a realistic chance of signing and see if they are an improvement on what we already have...I think you will find most available players are no better than our current options so until that changes why sign them??

I remeber they announced Gidley very late and no-one knew who was going to play centre.
Perry came out the blue, i think, although Laffranchi (a long with waterhouse) had been speculated. I don't remember much being said about Hohaia before we signed him?

That's not a valid excuse. There have been plenty of players available in recent times and we've not moved to sign them. Chris Hill is now arguably the best prop in Super League and moved last season, Greg Eden has the potential to be as good as Billy Slater according to our new coach and he's moved clubs recently, so have the likes of Watts, Lynch, Ellis. Look at the signings other clubs have made in recent years, the likes of Dureau, Atkins, Ratchford and Hardaker. There are enough quality players about, we've just not got the right ingredients. Whether it's a lack of care because we've focused on the stadium, or more that we've simply not got anyone with the right squad building ability I don't know, but we've failed miserably with recruitment over the last 6-7 years and the best young players we've produced have also left the club.

You forgot Gary Wheeler and your mate Wello!

Thank god you lot are in the minority.

Chris Hill being the exception...when Catalans signed Dureau Kyle Eastmond was replacing Long as our 7 and without a crystal ball to tell the future, we didnt know he was going to move to union. Same with Atkins, when Wire signed him we had Gidley and Talau in centres and we wouldnt have played him in front of either of them. Watts is another Scott Moore and often finds himself in trouble so I doubt we would look at him, Lynch (whilst a good player) is past his best now and wont be long til he retires. As for Hardaker...what planet are you on? I live in Leeds and a lot of my good mates are Leeds fans and even they moan about him not being good enough (apart from a handful of games this season) so why would we want him? The players you have mentioned there were no better than what we had at the time they were available (with the exception of Ellis but I am more than happy with Manu signing and Ellis has struggled with injuries of late) so why would we have gone for them?

As for the best youngsters leaving the club over the last 6-7 years, Eastmond went to RU and we let Smith go who has done OK at Salford and moved to Wigan...other than that which youngsters have we let go that have gone on and proved that we should have kept them? Only one I would have kept is Jake Emmitt tbh who looks wasted at Cas.

Dont get me wrong, I would love nothing more than for us to sign world class players like Lyon, Sculthorpe etc again but if those players arent available at the moment there is nothing we can do about it. IMO we have a squad which is capable of beating Warrington (as we showed earlier in season) and I think we can also challenge Wigan in the playoffs, sat 3rd in the league and still in a transitional phase after losing Long, KC, Scully, Graham and moving to a new stadium...things could be a lot worse for us

Hear, hear. It's utter fantasy to talk about all the great players moving clubs that we should be signing. There are very, very few. And we're not the only club desperate to fill vital positions and having to make do with mediocrity for the time being as there is simply nothing better available. Look who's going to be filling the #7 shirt at Wigan next season. Has Wigan's recruitment "failed" too? No - they're simply stuck in the same boat as we are and that every other club is of having to make do. Leeds and Warrington will join us in that boat once their major players start retiring over the next few seasons too. And even if there were loads of great players available - what kind of one-eyed arrogance is it to suggest that Saints should be signing every single one of them? There are 13 other clubs on the market for any players around (at super inflated prices relative to their worth given the lack of talent out there) and Saints have no God-given right to win a bidding war for every single one of them...

We are a couple of players and a good coach away from competing at the top level again. That fact may disappoint the knee-jerkers who want an excuse to start ripping at their clothes and wailing about our desperate plight and need to drown all of our current first team squad in the 'Otties and sign any and every second rate journeyman that comes on the auction block to replace them, but fact it still is. Deal with it.

They could be a lot worse, but if we follow the club's method of not being ambitious with signings, which you seem to support, we'll never get any better. Unless we sign someone for next season, which you suggest we shouldn't, we're not going to improve. Manu is a decent signing, but at 33 he's not a long term solution and his improvement over Flannery is counterbalanced by the downgrade of Shenton for Turner. We'll still be lacking in the front row and we'll still be lacking in the halves and we'll still be lacking massively at fullback.

The current crop of youngsters, Wheeler, Gaskell, Makinson. Clough, Dixon etc are all looking very average players at the moment. We are ruining Makinson in particular, he should have taken Wellens' place two years ago yet is still on the wing and it's questionable whether he'd have played at all this season had Gardner not got injured.

There isn't the basis of a good side there at the moment. The key positions are 1,6,7,8,9,10 for me and we're only doing well in one of those positions currently with Robes at 9.

Super League is so utterly awful that the academy could probably finish mid table, but the fact we're third shouldn't be a comfort blanket.

...and yet that league is apparently stuffed full with quality players better than we currently have up for grabs that we should be signing to replace them....

Do you want to have a little think about your logic there for a few minutes matey?

When did I say it was stuffed with them? I said there were enough about for us to make decent progress towards building a squad. Look at Warrington's rise, they are under the same cap as we are yet they are capable of pulling off the signings of Hill (Who looks like he will become as good as Graham), Ratchford, Atkins etc who would all waltz into our side and who would all improve us significantly. Huddersfield also made some very impressive signings to improve their squad over the years.

Why aren't we signing the likes of Eden, Atkins, Ratchford, Hill, Broughton, Hardaker? If we don't make these signings, we won't ever get the next Long, Cunningham, Sculthorpe etc. We seem to have this blind faith in our youth system, but it's producing SL squad players, but no real quality of late.

Professional sport should be about trying to win. We seem far too comfortable with planning for stable mediocrity right now. There doesn't seem to be any commitment to creating a winning side again.

The likes of Bateman and Copkzak seem to be headed the way of Warrington and Huddersfield. Bateman is another fantastic prospect who we're not in the race for. Another potentially great signing for Warrington. Sure we can't sign them all and they won't all blossom into all-time greats, but when clubs like Warrington are signing 4 or 5 like that they are added players to their squad that will be there for 10+ years potentially and forming the backbone of a squad that could rumble on for a decade. Wigan have a far better youth system than we do so are producing Tomkins' and Charnleys etc. So do we just accept that they are better than us and not bother?