According to this mornings League Express Atkins has agreed to go to Warrington Wolves from the 2010 season,seen as he has 2 years left remaining on his current contract do you think we'll go for a player swap or money based transfer?.

I know he has had a fair bit os stick of late with his inability to pass to his left but other than Shenton at cas he is one of a few players who looks capable of been a international player for a long time to come.

Just seen that myself.

Money, money money................

Wire forking out a bit of cash to make Matt King look a bit better?

I for one am disappointed by this news. I know I've criticised Atkins for not passing to his winger but that can easily be rectified. We have the current England centre and if he goes who are we going to replace him with. As much as I liked James Evans when he was here he is not one for the future.

Very disappoined unless we have something up our sleeve. I've always said I don't care who leaves the club as long as they are replaced by someone as good or better. I'll wait and see who we sign to replace him - if he is going.

the league express has had links on this board a few times recently and so far some of the reports have been unfounded. i certainly hope he isn't going because as you say, who is gonna replace him? if they are as good they will cost as much unless they are overseas or older, neither of which is where we should be headed if possible

Gonna be dishing out some money next year if all the rumours are right are wire. Myler sinfield and now atkins, surely they can't all be right can they? All under contract to aren't they? They won't come cheap

Transfer fees aside, I think Wire might be able to get people on relatively cheaper contracts than before as they now have a coach who actually can offer players the chance of winning something, where as before some of their big money would have likely gone on paying well over the odds.

They must be shedding some to be able to fit these under the cap though - anyone know who is leaving?

Wonder if the England boss is abusing his position and offering a little more then a club place?!

Johnson, Rauhihi, Carney

Adam has been dropping hints for a while now about something going on.

Not heard anything from up high - but if the cash / swap was deemed good value by the football committee - i.e. sanctioned by JK - then we would do it.

From what I have heard recently, JK can be more 'hard-nosed' about just how much a player is worth than the other football directors - so wait for the details (assuming there is some truth in it) before hanging anyone for selling our current England international.

I would also note that I join those who would be disappointed to see him go. I believe that we are guilty of not appreciating the value of the assets we have. I was slated for calling MK 'awesome' on Friday - yet his effort was what made the difference in an otherwise dour game. I feel that we have singled Ryan out far too much for criticism of what he doesn't do well, and forgotten about all the things he does do well. Now it looks like we will miss him - now he' going!

Thats wat I mean in transfer fees. 3 internationals won't come cheap

I'm ok with JK being hard nosed. He is keeping us in the black by doing that.
We have to accept if Atkins is getting interest from the big clubs who can pay him the big bucks, we shouldn't try and match them if we can't afford it.
Saying that, I'd still like to keep him if we can.

right , it looks like Ryan as finally indicated his intentions for next year.

hopefully he can now carry on with the job in hand and play his heart out for the next few months. Maybe with this burden of his shoulders he may just give us a few games to remember him by.

tbf i think we have come as far as possible with Ryan and likewise so has he with wakefield im sure Mr Kear will have something up his sleeve.

he's 23 how can that be as far as we can go?

trb you say jk can be hard nosed about what a player is worth and pay him accordingly but what relevance is that if he is under contract ?

Thought the hard-nosed was more about how much of a transfer fee they were willing to offer (to be spent in M&S of course by Ted) or what player+ cash they were willing to offer in return.

Glesson is really the replacement. He should get a regular run at centre now with a young one covering him.
Other centre is either Martin or a replacement for Martin.

and find another Gleeson we can pick up while they are young from other club. Did that with George too but not quite the same level of success

I'd think fans would more likely see it though as 'sell Atkins, replace with Evans'. Although if the funds it frees up are used towards Darren Lockyer at 6, then fair enough.

indeed, mis read it.

not completely convinced replacing atkins with another gleeson is the way forward, especially when we have murphy and george in the wings who are not far behind i would imagine. and we would definitely be weaker if we swapped atkins and only brought in evans imo.

whatever happens will happen i suppose

It's a 3-dimensional thing:

How much is his contract
How much is being offered (cash / players)
How much will a suitable replacement cost and will that leave me some left over for other areas of the squad

He knows his eggs you know!

Time for you to phone a friend

We've got the money.

As I said to those who were going over the top in recent weeks,
[i"be carefull what you wish for"[/i

I've also said on a few occasions we should revel in the good things that Ryan does instead of slating him for his shortcomings. He's still adding things to his game, some players make the 1st team and have all the skill in the world but can't handle the physicality, Adam's doing it the other way round.

I'll be gutted if he goes because as good as he is he will only get much better over the next 3 or 4 years.

Identifying weak areas is the easy bit young players, them having the maturity to apply themselves to fixing those weaknesses is the hard bit, Ryan at 23 is at that stage.

He will also improve because of the company he's mixing with. Playing for England and being in a play off situation will help his game loads. If he moves to another club they will see the benefit and not us.

On a side note, I noticed in the LE this morning that Leeds are unlikely to renew the contract of Ashley Gibson at the end of this year.
He's out of contract and would cost us nothing, we should even look at signing him now for the rest of this season (SC permitting).
He is a skillfull centre who has plenty of SL experience and a good grounding from Leeds youth system.

Rumours on Cas board about him going there.

Ashley Gibson could be a good call!

If Ryan goes to the Wolves whats the odds on Paul Johnson coming in the other direction? Although he'll be 31 come the start of next season is that another 30+ too many?

Well once agian, and I don't want to come over as a know it all, I pushed the club to investigate the possibility of Gibson over a year ago.

Along with Kopczak, Flannigan etc...