Another one we've missed out on.

This will come back to haunt us.

A good signing, look forward to seeing him in Super League.

St Helens are a disgrace, what kind of youth policy is this?????

This is a blatant slap on the face to youth development and the salary cap.

He isnt even a current international.

Our game is going to the dogs, thanks McManus.

I always reserve judjement on Aussie imports...we've had a real mixed bag as have most clubs. You get ...

The ones that 'need a year to settle in' ....then come good
The ones that 'need a year to settle in' ........and never ever come good
The ones that come over here with big reputations..and fail to deliver
The ones who get 'home sick' ....and bugger off early
The ones who are class and you count down the days til they go home hoping they'll extend their stay

I'm sure we can all think of example players to fit the bill for most categories.

Have to say I'm impressed with saints this year..missing a lot of players in key positions and playing real well. Your 'big' names are really standing up...I just wonder how long they can keep doing it with so many out.

well said, my sentiments exactly

Pretty sure it was sarcastic because thats what you get from saints trolls on our board when we sign an aussie.

yeah unfortunately i wasnt being,
i think its disgusting and hypocritical of saints, their fans, their board, and rfl as a whole

You need to chill mate, you've been on our board all Mornin spouting the same stuff.

Youth isn't the answer to everything and youth can't replace every player that leaves (would be good but impossible) or we'd all just play our youth teams.

The has to be a balance of youth and old for it to work. Going all out youth may harm the club but also harm the kids if they are getting beat every week and getting a physical beating.

With foster, wheeler, Ashe, Armstrong, lomax, Dixon, magennis, ashurst, clough, Gaskell we have enough youth not forgetting shenton, Moore,LMS and Sia are still under the age of 25.

Also we've lost jammer and eastmond who are still young lads.

Add roby to above post

Dont worry we are getting Puletua instead

Has agreed terms with saints now.

We're hardly looking short of back rowers next season.

he probably will come to wire as anderson is heavily linked with a move to catalan and we will need a replacement plus doesnt look like saints will be chalanging next year unless the youngsters pull one out of the bag.

You're right - it's not exactly a priority area!

He is a good player though.

We won't be challenging next year? We are challenging this year with a massive injury list, playing away every week and had the eastmond saga to deal with!

We will be stronger next year playing at home, good quality players coming in and the great batch of young players we have will be a year older.

Good post mate, you made me laugh.

Really?

I also read on the superleague.co.uk article that Saints will be losing Leon Pryce as well. Does anyone know which club he's going to?

Another one we've missed out on.

This will come back to haunt us.

Then you obviously dont understand the importance of experience within a team. Imagine where we would be without Hoffman this year or Deacon last year; look how much we struggled without Gleeson until Pat came back in. He is a BRILLIANT signing and noone cares about Saints signing him its just those fans that used to say the same things about us signing aussies that is annoying but at the end of the day. Saints themselves didnt come out saying "how dare wigan sign Hoffman and Lima" it was a select few of their fans so technically you can only moan about those fans not the team the board and dont even understand why you included the RFL?

Reckon him and his brother will end up at Bradford next year. Leon see out his career at his hometown club and Karl getting his last chance in the city he's from. If anything can fire him up its gotta be playing for his hometown club. Not sure how he was treated by them when he left etc though so may not but I think Leon is about 75% certain that Bradford is his destination.

Ive never heard of Laffranchi?



Is he any good?

Doesnt what saints are doing remind you of where we were at 5/6 years ago? - Star names retiring / jumping ship, and in desperation offering vastly inflated salaries to big names to try and keep pace with the top of the table?

Saints paid more than we were able to afford for Shenton and LMS if rumours are to be believed, and they're now outbidding NRL teams with much higher salary caps than your average SL club, for average antipodeans with big reps!

It makes you wonder how balanced their salary cap must be - certainly nowhere as near as ours. While Saints will just about manage to keep pace this season - I'd expect them to finish 3/4th, I expect them to dip to 5/6th next year and the next few after that.

Quite simply this wont work for them, they will end up with a very unbalanced team and shallow squad and the likes of Laffranchi / O'haia / LMS/ Shenton, whilst being good players, are not good enough to step into the boots of Cunningham / Graham / Long / Eastmond etc, the same as Pongia / Craig Smith / Vaelaiki / Orr / Seuseu / Fletcher etc, were no Farrell / Newton / Cassidy / Cowie / Farrell etc for us.

Saints are certainly in transition.

Very good.

Laffranchi will be your Bryan Fletcher which is a much better comparison IMO. Bailey was always a poor mans Fletcher, but then Fletcher was a poor Mans Farrell - just as Laffranchi would be a poor mans Sculthorpe or Graham.