Watched mago play numerous times. Hard runner, good Defender and can put a hit on. Seems to always play from the bench for souths. Not sure whether he is seen as an impact player from the bench or whether he is naturally seen as behind in the pecking order (i think this with the likes of luke burgess in the team). I like what i see though and think he will be a real handfull over here.

Ellis i will be honest i dont watch many of the dragons games so can't really comment on him. I am going to go back and watch one with him in now and see how he goes (NRL 360 is well worth it btw,, especially if you share the cost out with someone because it is expensive by itself).

Miski, keeps getting called a championship player but i have to disagree. What i have seen of him this season is a player playing well above the level he is competing at. Only signing a 1 year contract was a statement of intention to where he wanted to be and see's himself also, confident. He has played fullback for london this season so nice to have that option with how injury prone we seem to be. He is a big guy (NRL esque winger size) and seems to have the speed to back it up too. Worth noting when on the wing he plays outside our very own hankinson and they seem to work well together, maybe tactical by the club? Hankinson gets a full year of gametime and gets to build up a partnership with our new winger / target signing?

Could work out well for us next season if we are going the hankinson route at centre. Would be a cheaper option as we already have him. I rate hankinson tbh i think he has the potential to be a SL centre just not given a proper shot at it. When he had a run of games a couple years ago he fed his winger well, tackles well and kicks well. Remeber at leeds he lined up opposite hurrell and kept him quiet all game. Now not saying he is the same quality as hurrell on the whole but he had a clear gameplan to execute of quick line speed and strong defence to keep him out the game and it worked, barely even noticed he played. His kicking is obviously a bonus to us aswell, he kicked 8/8 the other week and doesn't miss many.

Just seen miski on wigan TV. Looks a powerfull player! Built like a brick house!

I must agree with you about Miski and people saying that he's a championship player well he will be as he plays for a championship team,anyone who has played in the NRL is worth a crack what have we got to loose he's hardly going to be on marquee money

You cannot just swap and change people around like that.

Played most of his youth career so far at second row, then move him to centre because of these attributes, then move him back in a few years to second row. It doesn't work like that for 99% of players.

Couldn't agree more with this...particularly with centres - probably the most difficult place to play positionally, and very very good players with all the attributes to be a great centre have time-and-time-again failed to adapt to the position. It's as specialist as half back.

There's loads of examples of it working. I'd certainly consider him as a centre option unless he shows us he can no longer player there (he did see some time at centre in academy, no idea about before that).

Anyone seen anything on Ellis yet. I have heard he isn’t that good but NRL standard to SL he maybe able to prove himself

I remember seeing him and was impressed with his ability to play the link man. Good passing game for a “middle”. He’s not a prop or a 13 but the modern type of middle forward.

He’s much more suited to that role than with Harvard or Partington. Harvard is a Prop and Partington for me is a Prop trying to be a “middle” forward.

Ellis is by no means a super star but he will add size and that bit of mongrel the team lacks up top. He gets in the opposition faces and likes to disrupt

He was most recently linked with a move to Cas so when we announced him I was a little surprised but pleased.

He will go well in SL in my opinion.

Kade Evans was reported as possible move to SL with Cas interested, im not sure if Ellis was on their radar

Both Ellis and Mago are in their respective squads for the weekend.

Looking at South Sydney's social media, a lot of thier fans would have liked to have kept Mago. I'm taking that as a positive.

Mago played for Souths at the weekend and had decent minutes, looked solid.

As for KPP at centre, he may be quick 'for a forward', but is quick for an outside back? And, as noted, the defensive aspect of the position in particular is not easy.

I was one who called for trying him at centre when we were struggling in the backs using Farrell and Isa, he was unfortunately injured, after seeing him play he has good hands but no sign of the pace needed for centre. We have had success over the years with Gilmour, Wild, Tompkins even Hughes covering centre but they all had pace. I would like to see KPP in open space to see if he has the acceleration needed to play in the backs.

I’d hope we’d have enough options in the backs next year to avoid needing to go down the route of second rowers covering centre. French is staying, so Hardaker and Bibby are already centre options and Thornley is likely to be added. They may even bring back Hankinson according to reports, so we could have good depth. I’d be looking to get KPP to put some size on in the off season and concentrate on playing in the back row. I’m not saying he should be bulking up too much but an extra stone on him and he’ll be an even bigger handful than he is proving already.

Very happy with these signings.

Main concern from that summary is that we really needed two out and out front rowers. Sounds like he'll do well for us but I probably would have preferred for the 2nd signing to be of a similar ilk to Mago.

That all sounds good. For next season anyway. But it's all a blank slate really, isn't it?

Not exactly well known top class NRL players but with the current poor financial state of the club, I supposed they are the best we can afford from down under at the present time.

.... and will no doubt still be 200% better than 'ten minute Tony'.

We need to break down the 10 minute spells into the minutes he actually does something, 10 minute Tony could soon be 2 minute Tony.

In some contexts 2 minutes is pretty good

Evans was rumoured to be joining Cas or Hull last off season.

Ellis had been linked with a move to Cas a month or so ago, I’d heard it was a done deal. Obviously not.

But, will they still be playing for the club after seven seasons, having had a major operation and after a eight match suspension having to help bolster a present front row which includes two poor "experienced" signings in Bullock and Singleton and young and inexperienced lightweight props like Havard and Partington.

Or will they like others in more recent seasons, be no different to than the likes of Navarette, Nuuausala, Pettybourne, Tautai,

The signing of prop forwards from outside the club in recent seasons has been poor, especially missing Alex Walmsley playing for Batley!

Not sure we missed Alex Walmsley as we certainly had a close look at him when he was at Batley.

My understanding was that we decided not to make a move for him because of concerns regarding his mobility in particular his lateral movement.

Big mistake on our part obviously.

I don’t know what you want. Us to go out and sign the Australian starting props? I could be wrong but has any other SL club in recent memory done that? Mago and Ellis are exactly the type of props we need.

Lightweight he may be but he, by some distance, is our best prop. Kinda makes your underhanded downplay of him mute, no?

You can ask “will they be this or that” all you - and we - want; ultimately we’ll not know until they’re here. Why don’t you just for once give them a chance?

I’ve not seen any of the South’s game this morning (f@ck the NRL) but Mago’s stats look exactly what we need. He made 12 carries for 169 metres according to the league live app. I believe they calculate it differently to over here but it’s encouraging either way.