I wouldn't question anyone reassessing their life choices under the current C-19 situation.

It's strange times and sometimes you just have to do whatever feels best for yourself, your family & career.

Good luck to him regardless of whether he stays or goes.

No doubt all will be revealed in due course but I agree that this may have more to do with Norman than it does Widdop and the fact that they share the same agent.

Also, too early to say whether or not the Widdop signing is worth the money anyway.

I think you’re all following a pied piper. I don’t believe it, it goes against everything Widdop said last season.
If you remember he wouldn’t be drawn into any discussion about his signing to Warrington because he was intent of giving everything for St George.
When the NRL 2019 season finished, he was lapping up being a Wire and wanting to engage with family here.
I don’t buy it. I might look a lone tool again, but I’ve had that before and came out smelling of apple blossom.

What's that old saying??..

..'If you throw enough sh!+e at a wall, some of it eventually sticks??'....

Getting a little tired of our continual search for the magic bullet former NRL half-back only for it fail and fail again. Would like to see either Patton or Dean fill that third HB role or if we are going to recruit, how about a return for Gaz O'Brien? Shouldn't have been allowed to leave in the first place imo.

Tough guy GOB, but over Ratchford?..and now over Ashton/Ratchford/Widdop?
No no no.
Keep going forward, improving, not returning to failings.

Considering Gareth O'Brien has an option says a lot about the quality of half backs in this country.

What's Joe Mellor upto, because he was twice the player GOB was/is?

Waiting for his wages to be paid, by Toronto, like o brien is

The Wire halfback cycle:

1. Home grown halfback plays in the first team, is average at best. Fans get fed up and decide he isn't the answer and clamour for us to sign a halfback.
2. We sign an NRL halfback. Everyone gets excited, rubber duckie predicts we will "win the lot".
3. NRL halfback doesn't work out, fans claim they are fed up with bringing in Aussies that want to go back home and say we should give a home grown player a chance.
4. Repeat from 1.

It's great signing big name aussie half backs but how many NRL halves have come here on 2-3 year deals and won super league (with that I don't count players like Tommy Lauluai or any of the Paul Brothers who were here for years)
So I get Blake Green and Lance Hohia but even that has an asterix against it.
I can't think of many others but list either british or long term NRL exports
Deacon
Williams
Lomax
Matty Smith
Burrow
Maguire
Tony Smith (not that one)
Henry Paul
Robbie Paul
Long
Martyn
Pryce
Etc etc

There is something in that.

We had a British halfback, who played at one club for longer than any of them, and was at least in the top two or three of that group in terms of talent, and never won SL once.

Yes Sal a bit like Paul Cooke and Danny Brough. There are exceptions and also lots of good NRL halves that have come here for a year or two and not won it. Maybe it is pure coincidence.
I hope Widdop and Austin play the season out lift the SL trophy and they can go back to Sydney and shove my dodgy theory where the sun don't shine.

I think it comes down to the fact that all those players you list were at one of four clubs: Wigan, Leeds, Saints and Bradford, which are the only clubs to have won SL. All of them had much stronger teams across all positions, and strong leaders on the field, which meant they weren't reliant on being carried by a star player in the halves.

I can't think of any team which was carried by a superstar playmaker in the halves which has won SL. Leeds would have been closest, with Iestyn Harris, but they lost the GF, and by the time they were winning, they had fine players in Burrow, McGuire and Sinfield at 13, but had a much stronger all round team. The other one where you could have made a case to being down to one superstar playmaker was Bradford with Henry Paul if they'd won in 1999. By the time they did win SL with HP, they were playing a power game and he was less decisive, he left after their first GF win and they replaced him with Brandon Costin and their level didn't drop at all as they won another two GFs.

Similarly with Saints, Long, Martyn and Pryce were very fine players but they didn't carry their team. Their most influential players were probably Cunningham and Sculthorpe, or maybe their props like Fairleigh / Britt.

It would have been interesting, if Paul Cooke and Richard Horne had come through at Leeds and McGuire and Burrow had come through at Hull, how many SL titles each would have got. My guess is, a lot for Cooke and Horne, none for McGuire and Burrow. Also if Briers had stayed at Saints, and replaced Tommy Martyn, how many SL titles would he have got. Again, I would guess a lot.

On the short-term NRL star signing, when we signed Allan Langer I remember it being between us and Wigan trying to get him. If Wigan under Endacott had had Langer instead of Willie Peters, would they have won SL? On the form he showed with us in 2000 especially, I think they would have been very difficult to beat. Imagine what he could have done with the runners they had outside him - his mate Renouf...Connolly, Radlinski, Robinson, Dallas...

You can’t conquer and sustain it in RL without a dominant pack...it’s a repetitive oversight folly of Wire since turn of the 80s.
Most of my criticism of Wire is always centred around this. Every time we’re linked with another back...I ask the same question...can he play prop.
I’ve started enough threads on here about props, hoping we’ve a secret board member amongst us, who’d finally take the poking.

As often proved at international level, top class half backs in the British game are as rare as rocking horse poop.

In fact, as was mentioned in another thread, backs in general are of a mediocre standard.

The only thing that connects the successful sides of the SL era is their ability to produce players in ALL positions (Bradford don't count as they made themselves bankrupt chasing the dream). Until we can produce a steady cycle of home grown players, then we will forever be chasing our tail.

The thing we have to learn is that our marquee signings (and even all our overseas players) should be icing on the cake and not players we are entirely dependent on, as we often seem to find ourselves.

https://www.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... ve-reports

https://www.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... ve-reports

Asked to comment on the so-called swap on TV last night St George coach Paul Mcgregor said it was news to him and he is on the recruitment committee.

Morley, Carvell, Monaghan, Westwood, Higham...

We have spent sh!+loads on all positions. Probably more than any other club in the SL era.

Like I said, our issue is our inability to bring through quality, relatively low waged youngsters to support those big money signings, which is what success is built on.

It put us in the mix. Wasn’t dominant enough through a sustained period. It hit peaks yes.
My point is still valid. That pack now would most likely be perfect for this season. They had mostly peaked and we were a top class prop short to get us over the line back then.

Prop was not the reason we lost that first final.

2012 we were done by a side with a champion mentality.

2013 we were done by injuries to 2 key players.

Neither were due to our forward pack. In fact, 2011-2013, our pack was arguably the best in the league.

Don't forget Hill & Wood.
My view of winning the GF though is that a team needs a coach who will instil win at all costs into his players ,whether by cynical play or by knowing how to bend the rules & con the officials. Rules ,especially the basics like ptb, offside & forward pass, seem to get overlooked a lot of the time in the final probably to speed the game up & fit in with sky tv. Foul & dirty play is another obvious winner of the GF, as we have seen on numerous occasions & not just involving the Wire.

It’s the reason we were not finishing in the best possible position to win the finals season on season.
We had our best chance in 2011 and screwed it up. Either side of that, we just have lacked heavy clout.

You finish top throughout the regular season, the final is almost routine and easier on the players.

Agreed 2020 doesn’t have that requirement, and has so will be a token championship for whoever wins.

Your earlier post said effectively we had failed to build a dominant pack since the 80’s I was pointing out that we had a dominant pack, sufficient to get us to Finals and in other circumstances to have won 2 finals. I would be the first to accept that currently we are in desperate need of another dominant prop, but that wasn’t the point we were discussing.