Quote ="HXSparky"Leigh have just two problems to overcome. The first is whether the assembled group of players can gel as a team, and the second is whether they can then have the collective mental fitness and fortitude to excel in the 8's.
You have a great coach, but getting the individuals you've recruited to perform will be a real challenge for him. Making the top four, and tbh, top spot in the Championship should be an assumption for you, but when it starts with the tough stuff in the 8's I'm not so sure you have the right leader to make the next step. Just my opinion.
My allegiance is obviously with Fax, and I do believe we can make a very creditable challenge this year, and I really look forward to our battles to come.
All the best for 2016, and hopefully a Championship team can make it through into SL for 2017!!'"
I understand where people re coming from when they point to the trouble these players had at Salford but I really don't think that'll be a problem at Leigh. Salford had a series of changing not particularly great coaches and a megalomaniacal owner in it for his ego who regularly publically blamed individual players when things went wrong, who seemed to want to be involved in everything despite having no RL experience. At Leigh we've got Paul Rowley who's said many times the number 1 responsibility of a coach is to ensure their players are happy & enjoying playing Rugby. We've got an owner & Director of rugby who loves being involved in Leigh and seems to be willing to do almost anything to ensure Leigh players are looked after and will defend the players to the hilt (too much so at times when trolls are just trying to get a rise out of him). Looking at behind the scenes videos, following the players on twitter & listening to them at LISA meetings and Q&A events they all seem happy & talk about the positive atmosphere "in the camp". Look at Hock, before he came he was a disruptive thug, with the support he's got at Leigh he's a different player. I'm confident the new players are already gelled into the team after the army camp, pre-season training together now all together in Lanzarote.
If the team has the mental fortitude to keep with it if things get tough in the Qualifiers, well in my opinion that was the main problem last year. Hopefully everyone will have learnt from that last year & know how to handle it next time. The experienced players brought in will also hopefully help with that.
