It surprises me that both Smith and Price were/are keen on Eastmond to be honest. Is this Morans influence by any chance, rather than someone Price has identified as being a good fit?

Who were your half-backs at the time?

Ratchford has to stay at FB for me.....IF he comes...and its a big IF IMO...he will replace Brown at 6

No way. Ratchford was a poor six and is thriving from not having responsibility as a main play maker. Right now he is playing the best football of his career at fullback and it would be a ridiculous decision to move him out of that role.

Agree with this.

It wasn't that long ago you said he wasn't a fb.

Ratchford is the best English fullback in Superleague.

I wouldn't argue with that...but if I had Sam and Steph in the same team....both of them would play and Ratch would be my 6 and Sam my 1.

This. Crazy to suggest anything else!

I think initially it was Leon Pryce and Sean Long (And we still didn't win the Grand Final, shows how standards have dropped in SL. Can you imagine how dominant a team with those two in the same side would be these days?), but quickly became the infamous 'Lomaskell', Lomax and Gaskell. Eastmond did play at 1, 6 and 7, but was terrorised by the fans, players and coaches in the halves at Saints because he was so scared of taking the line on.

Looking at Youtube clips of him from last year, he seems plenty fast enough, lightening quick. I think he could be a great signing for you.

He'll do for me. Everything is a risk but I'd be dead chuffed if we get him.

Same here.

You sure they aren’t old clips from a few years back? If he’s still pretty damn good I don’t why he can’t get a gig in a sport where you don’t need to be that quick.

So with Patton signing an extension it looks like next year will be Eastmond and Patton at 6 and 7 - would we be happy with that?
I am assuming Roberts is going home, and Brown is retiring.

It could be that one of Roberts/Patton will still be here and first choice with Eastmond, and Patton is re-signing on the expectation that Eastmond will spend a lot of time on the treatment table and there will still be plenty of first team opportunities.

I have a bad feeling about Eastmond, although Price and the staff must be better informed in terms of seeing his current form and fitness.

This year we seem to have had a really good team spirit without any big names or egos. Charnley is a big signing but he seems the kind of guy who can fit in well to a dressing room. When Eastmond was at Saints things seemed to go badly between him and the club. He had injury issues then as well.

My concern is we will end up with Eastmond on a 3 or 4 year contract spending a lot of time out injured and eating up space on the cap which restricts the opportunity to sign other players. If he still has the attributes he had in his younger days, when he was similar to Jason Robinson in terms of explosive speed and ability to flat foot defenders and beat them one on one, he would be a great asset, but if his body has started to decline then it could be he has had the best days of his career and is going to play out the rest of his career as a lesser version of his former self, and one that is often injured too.

Big assumption over Roberts, I think that issue is a long way from being settled. Dec Patton would have to improve a great deal this season to be first-choice 6, and if teamed with Eastmond (though I would take a gamble on signing him) we would be starting 2019 once again with an untested half-back combination.

Sally's got the old crystal ball out again. Plenty of assumptions. My crystal ball tells me that Patton won't be in the first choice as a half-back.

I hope not unless there is a dramatic improvement in his ability to create opportunities and lead the team around the field. I laughed when I read that "Future of Warrington" nonsense, people seem blind to his limitations and forget how we play when he is at halfback.

This!

IF Roberts goes (which is pure speculation) I want to see this money spent on an equivalent out and out half back. Eastmond isn’t the solution to Roberts leaving, and although I’m glad Patton is staying I think Price sees his value in the role he is currently utilised, not as a replacement for Brown.

Maybe I’ve just got my maths wrong and we can afford to have a decent half-back pairing PLUS Eastmond hanging about in the background slowly readjusting to the game.

And this too!

I suppose the big issue is cost, and particularly wrt the salary cap. Someone posted on here that he wanted £400k. But if he wants that kind of money, why isn't he being snapped up by a RU club ? If the figure is correct, I would guess that the figure was what his agent wanted and that £250k tops would be more realistic for a 29 year old (July) with a penchant for the injury room. That would mean a salary cap figure of around £125k in the first year of what I guess would be a 2 year contract.

Looking at the pros and cons, £125k would be fine, it would be pretty close to the likes of Hill and Clark I would have thought. On the debit side, he was renown for his speed off the mark and ability to break the line and that must surely be slower at the age of 30. Then as mentioned, he is injury prone. Also, how eager is he to play RL, and specifically Wire ? I may be doing him a disservice, but he sounds as though he is chasing the money to round off his pension - particularly as he has already turned us down a year or so ago.

Nobody seems to have seen him playing recently to judge his abilities, so you would have to go with the view of the coaching staff ...but he doesn't exactly look like a compelling buy.

£125k may be fine and affordable to a rich club, but it’s the amount of cap space we are using that worries me. Eastmond could prove the doubters wrong and be fantastic from day one, but it’s the less likely scenario. Decent players in Super League come much cheaper than £125-250k per season and we could probably get a couple of decent younger backs than that.

I have a feeling this is purely a publicity stunt to allow the headline ‘Former RU international joins Wire’... I don’t like to be negative about stuff at the moment but this sort of thing reminds me of when we were rubbish and would get excited at the prospect of a new player being the saviour of the club, only to find that we were just as rubbish with a highly paid former star getting walked over every week looking disinterested.

Dearly hope I’m wrong on this one though

Cap space is no issue.
It's £2m next season plus 2 marquee.
There'll only be Wire getting close to cap. The others other than Toronto, if they come up, can't afford it.

This may be true. Who do you have in mind for Half Back that could be available under transfer (or is off contract) for 2019 for £125-250k ?