Disagree. His injuries were of the kind you get when you put your body on the line, not those of someone whose body is fekked.

At the time, I was happy to go along with the club's judgment. With hindsight, I was wrong. And so was the club.

Same with Beaver.

Was told the injury excuse was just a smoke screen for him been released.

I would say that the two main signing problems were Harris and Orford.

Harris because of the financial damage it did to us and the loss of top quality homegrown players as well as hamstring our recruitment in the following years.

Orford because of his utter contempt for the club which lead to the "will he won't he" situation where again, when it comes to recruitment, our hands are tied as we don't know how much salary cap space we have spare and what positions we need to recruit for. This also was not helped by the fact we were changing head coaches and the coach we were getting was coming in from another club so wasn't able to fully concentrate on recruitment for his new club.


Hopefully, next years recruitment will not be as slapdash.

I can't remember the players, other than the ones you mention, but IIRC Ryan was about fifth choice in the centres when he left, and letting him go was pretty inevitable. To be honest, as others have said I don't think he's [ithat[/i brilliant; he looks good in a good side but is far from a world beater.
One I would disagree with is Wardle. I don't think we "let him go" as such, I think we were simply outbid by someone with more cash to throw at the juniors (which he then was) than we had. Not quite so sure about Larne Patrick but I'd guess the same applied there too.

Inexplicably losing to Wakefield and seeing them stay up because of it therefore costing us about 100k to get Solomona who we would probably have gotten for nowt had we beaten them and relegated them.

Yup, that was a stinker.

I saw Atkins play a few acadamy/alliance games in the year or so before he left. Looked a decent player at that level but certainly not a future international.

He seems to me to be the mirror image of Donaldson ie Donaldson = very talented junior but stopped growing once we signed him, Atkins = decent junior who then had growth spurt around the time he left us.

A couple for me
Tame Tupou - turning circle of a bus
Nick Zsiti ( a few year since now) - He made me laugh. The first fans signing he did had to go inside as he was cold....

Shaun Edwards...was never really gonna work..Tame toupu....never did any work .

Shame his metres made and tackle bust's don't back that up.

11. Pattrick Ah Van

Don't remind me about that game at home to Leeds in 1998 when the pass should have gone to Mr Edwards for a try that would have taken the score to 6-6.

Remember it well Mick...who was it that wouldnt pass ? it was either Matt Calland or Scott Naylor...IIRC.

Calland mate.

failed signing of ellis caused a lot of unrest

If only we had signed Brendon Tuuta, we'd have been the team of the 90s.

Brough from Cas (we signed Jeffries from wakey same off season)
Myler from Widnes
Robinson from Salford
Brown from Wigan

4 half backs who've moved clubs, who would not have commanded high wages, who would have jumped at the chance to come to Bradford, who are a vast improvement on anything we've had at 6 or 7 (Orford excluded) in the last 5 seasons. When you look at the dross we've had in key positions it is utterly shaming.

Tbf, all of whom would have been greeted with scepticism. They were all available for a reason, save Myler who I don't think was ever going to come here.

When you look at who we signed instead they were greeted with scepticism too (apart from Orford).

Who are you asking that we be fair to? The people who signed Sherriffe, Sykes (x3) Herbert plus many others. Whilst all signings are greeted with a mixture of hope and scepticism it is the role of management of the club to make decisions based on professional judgements. We're in 11th position and have been beaten by 60+ points at the weekend because the people in charge of recruitment and retention have shown appalling judgement. And I'm afraid that is a very fair assessment

Who was the player that (allegedly) was going to sign for us circa 1997, went for a trip to the races with the players and ended up having a punch up (allegedly) with Bradley, leading to collapse of signing?

Oooh! I dont know that story! Someone spill the beans!

But probably via PM in case he's a bloke who might get his lawyer involved...

Brough was always going to be a gamble - credit to him since those times he seems to have knuckled down a little.
Brown at the time I would not have taken, He would not have solved what we need now- plays well with brough or robinson alongside but without struggles/does not shine.
Myler's both left widnes richie(I am convinced he moved from widnes to salford but could be wrong) was missed but at the age he went salford was a lot closer to home for him. Stephen went to union and no way were we going to compete with their wages.

Tupou started well but faded with his own remarkable level of low confidence.
Sykes was fine at centre dropped a few passes but scored a lot of tries and held the line up. He plays 6 as we had no other real options- he irritated me massively with his predictability but was better option than others we had. Now he is public enemy no1 for giving it a shot (confidence lost through it and struggling as crowd jeers with every mention). He is home grown, willing to be a squad player and play were asked yeah sure he is not thurston or GI but give the man a break!

IIRC it was a different Myler at Widnes who went to play RU.