So do you honestly think Long will be just as good at Hull as he is/has been at Saints? Over the past 10 years Saints have had a special group of players playing together at one time, you can't just break that apart and expect them to be just as good with mediocre players.

And for the record, I'm not one of those people who says "'ere, he's only any cop 'cos Saints make 'im look good" (nice phonetics though). Sean Long is a class player but the other class players he's had around him add an extra 15% to his game, in my opinion.

as posted on our board, Long's appearance record since 2003

SL Games played last 6 years
2009 12 out of 14
2008 23
2007 17
2006 22
2005 20
2004 12 (year he got a ban??)
2003 28

there are loads of players with worse records than that

I personally think it'll be a good signing, as we are desperately lacking a game break and a leader.

Dobbo's going nowhere.

Mediocre players that behind leeds and saints have been the most successful squad in the last 4 seasons. We need a leader and playmaker, we've signed one of the best. Knocking on or not, he's exactly what Hull need.

Decorated; yes - the catalyst for Saints' success all those years; no.

Never done it on the biggest stage and still fancies himself too much to make a meaningful contribution to Hull next year. If they weren't (allegedly) splashing so much on his wages, he might be value for money for a couple of years, but I suspect he's on big, big money and it's a gamble at best.

going by your username, it would suggest you are a wigan fan? hardly in a position to criticise a club who (allegedly) are splashing out on a player, when your own club do exactly that and have won nothing for years!

The biggest critics of his signing seems to be Dull KR & Wigan fans.
Wonder why that is

What is this bigger stage you refer to? beating the aussies in Sydney, winning 3 lance todd trophies, Grand Final's

Michael Dobson?

Because Wigan hate Long and Rovers hate Hull FC, I'd say.

You can just SMELL the fear emanating from the Hull KR fans, now that Hull have signed Long.

Thats the drain in west hull you can smell?

Anyway I think Long is a decent signing and will do a good job for Hull.

we're not worried what Hull does, it;s the top 4 clubs that bother us now

Whether deliberate or not, awesome put-down mate.

Of course it was deliberate

There are many chickens being counted in East Hull, or miscounted perhaps. Must be hard to count with only 3 fingers and twelve toes.

Oh sorry I thought you were describing Paul Cooke.

Man for man we are not as good as Saints, but on our day we aren't far off. Yeaman, Raynor, Manu, Horne, Washbrook, Briscoe, Calderwood. They are all extremely dengerous players when given service, up with the best in the league imo, but they havn't had any since Paul Cooke left (Manu, Briscoe and Calderwood have never had any at all). Look at Yeaman the season when he was called up for GB. 23 tries in 20 games or something stupid like that. He and Cooke were devastating down that left side. Yeaman hasn't all of a sudden become a bad player. He just doesn't see any ball these days. Long can hopefully give us some width and a good kicking game and it will let the players mentioned above shine.

good post.

Agreed, on paper anyway. Unfrotunately we seem to lack passion, and despite Saints been a very skillful side IMO their biggest asset is their workrate.

As skillful as Saints are they 'have their day' more often then not thanks to their commitment and workrate. On paper our squad is pretty strong, on the pitch they let themselves down badly.

David Furner? Paul Anderson? Shane Millard? Chris McKenna?

All moved from one big club to another when over 30

Oh, and Long turned down a big offer from Wigan to sign for us too

One common denominator: All forwards

Alfie Langer played SOO at 36, and won the game for the Maroons

Probably the best performance I've ever seen from a scrum half, too.