fair comment. i'm not having a go at him, i just think that if we're paying over £80k for a player, then it should somebody game changing - or at least somebody that gets more game time.

i fear that we've seen this before, and that we have an nrl player that won't see his contract out because of personal reasons. how many women would want to travel half way round the world and have their first child away from their support network?

You entitled to your opinion as is everyone on this forum and im not saying your wrong im saying that i think different and im sure alot of people agree with you just as some will agree with me.Sorry if i came across abit rude, The point i was trying to get across is is a forward really known for been fast and scoring tries ? Not many people really appreciate the work these guys do and it often goes unnoticed, Yeah southern is nothing fancy but hes there to make the hard yards, Tire the oppositions pack, and tackle like a machine. The guy is hard as nails and never takes a backwards step and very rarely comes up with an error.Nothing fancy but gets the job done.

If you want to question player payments try Wilkes and Ellis first.

The Wilkes one crossed my mind too as i know he left to go to London for alot more money, more than double what we were offering. He may have taken a drop to come back, i dont know??

As for Southern, he was playing reserve grade over there. I cant see him getting mega bucks. Wont be the highest earner, but wont be at the lower end either. I would imagine that the players that had other offers ie, Ali, Mellars, Wilkes, Ellis, Fox & maybe Smith will be the higher earners. With maybe Raleigh & Kirmo not far off having come from Ken Davy's payroll.

Like i say, its all guess work. Irrelevant of what any of them are paid. Saturday was not good enough.

Trying to guess wages is not very helpful - they're paid somewhere between what they and the club thought they were worth when the negotiations took place.

All that matters is that Saturday's display is proven to be a blip, when they go out on Friday night and play with effort, endeavour and sufficient enthusiasm to play a jaded Cas side off the park; if not, I'll worry.

he is not on 80k , i doubt any of the other guys are.

have you ever been in the superbowl car park and seen their cars???????????

very few superleague players earn 80k i would say around 10% earn that or more at a push.

to put things into perspective i know for a fact that when winterstein signed for us he earnt 32,500 pro rata for his short stay.

the vast majority of our squad will be earning between 20 - 40k

do the math 20 players x 25k = £500,000

what is our turnover? cant be more than 1.5 million ?


Simples

Yes, he does look jaded, didn't know about his wife and baby, he does look tired and maybe needs a paternity break for a couple of weeks. He looked well battered in the post match interview. We certainly don't want another Tronk scenario. Probably the wrong choice as captain as he is playing an alternative role and not on the field enough.
Mainly, the half backs need to spark to take the pressure off him and others.

Lauititi was a poor mans version of Solo, at the moment with injuries and fitness I think I'd rather have ali.

Southern should possibly be back on the bench with Kirmond & Lauititi in the second row. Think like alot of others Southern looks unfit although not as bad as what Hickey was last season. If he is carrying an injury then rest him completely and get him and Collis right. If personal problems then 2 weeks off at least is a must.

Ellis tackles like a machine aswell and gets good yardage from dummy half and if he can be incorporated in the 17 with Aiton to loose and Washbrook on the bench then why not? Somone earlier mentioned 3 hookers in the team but Wood could interchange with Ellis and keep Aiton on at loose for the full 80 with his tackling technique.

Need to concentrate on the ruck area as that has been one re-emerging trend in the season so far along with the inability to deal with the high ball on our own try line. I'm sure R.A. is banging his head against a brick wall in training week in/week out working on these issues.

They were great against Catalan and Warrington so one week doesn't make a bad team.

Anyone describing Southern as class / quality needs there head looking at and should watch some 1/2 decent teams to understand what class is. I'd describe Westwood, Wilkin etc as Class / quality some might say world class.

The difference between Southern and individuals like Westwood is huge...

Southern is an average import that does a job plodding in, and some good defending nothing more nothing less.

We have very few class players at Wakefield.. Fox / Smith (on his day), Aiton, Amor, Ali Southern is certainly not one of them.

The only 'class' players we have are Tim Smith and Paul Aiton. Southern is a grafter much like Duncan McGillivary and Monty Betham. The problem is that we have too many 'grafters' in our team who are tied to our club! We gave 3 year deals out willy nilly, including one to a player who has not played this season at all.

At this moment in time I'd describe McGillivary & Betham to be head and shoulder above Southern..

Im not writing him off just yet but needs to up his game like a lot of other players...

There are others in the team who I am more worried about than Southern, every team does need a grafter or two I appreciate he has his value. I am more concerned that strike players aren't firing, Vince Mellars looks crap and ineffective and has an inability to pass to his winger. Issac John...well, I don't know! Cockayne has been rewarded with a 2 year extension despite conceding more points than he has scored. Fox is as ever suspect in defence.

We have Wildie, Tony and Ellis rotting in the reserves and I am thinking we need to give them the chance, could they do any worse?

Steve Southern is a good solid player no more no less, i think people on here expected him to be bursting through defences like Tony Williams and hit players like Sam Burgess. Not a prayer. How many games has he played prop againt players in excess of eighteen stone. He weighs about fifteen stone FFS.

And that is why our game is in the state it is..average player wont let you down but an overseas player over here taking the place of a homegrown / English player.

Southern is a grafter. His loss of form maybe due to having a newborn and him and his lass not having family to fall back on. But his wife was preggers when he signed he knew what he was involved and is well paid so hopefully things will settle down.

If he wants out of the club, id sooner him do it now rather than hang on for the rest of the season as thats not going to help anybody especially as hes the captain.Im not sure if the club knew his partner was pregnant or not when he signed for us but it appears to have certainly backfired plus maybe hes never fully recovered from his injuries? when he signed i expected him to be a hardhitting 2nd rower who could do the full 80 minutes as he used to get alot of game time with the cowboys in the nrl when he was there.

Where have all the drama queens suddenly come from.

He is a tough tackle and a decent ball carrier. He seems to the most driven so got the captains band when there was clearly no other option.

I've seen him play very well this year. We are battering him in the front row so won't get his best now but that's what we actually need as we ate lacking props.

One poor game and everybody starts moaning. They need more time....and more support from us than that.

Well said Pop Tart.


The guy needs to play second row and at least he put his hand up and had a go at prop, but thats not his position.
We shouldn't single out any individual player from Saturday, as we were poor from 1-17.
The Broncos showed what could be done with a very basic game plan with a decent kick on the last.
For me,we are lacking a midfield general. We struggle to make it to the last tackle and then if/when we do, we cant even finish the set off with
a decent kick, so there is no chance of building pressure.
The bizarre thing, is that we had played well for the last 3 weeks and then we had the worst performance of the season.

i for one would not single him out from saturday's game for any special attention. they were pretty much all awful from 1-17 as you say. for me the issue with southern is that we're paying him well, and he's just a straight up and down forward. surely we could have signed a british straight up and down forward? people do recognise that he's out of position, but i for one do not see an inspirational leader in him yet, perhaps this will come with game time if we ever get a prop. now ask me about aiton, he has captain written all over him at the moment.

if the rumours are true that he's not settled, then i doubt he'll see his contract out. it can be tough for people to be just tens of miles away from their support networks when they first have kids and not many thousands. i wouldn't be too surprised to see him complete the year then ask for a release.

Agreed poptart

The same was been said by certain people about Betham while he was here. He is now seen as a bit of a hero but I'm not sure if that is because of the 40+ tackles he used to make every week or the fact he tried to knock the tattooed freak out??

Maybe that's what you need to do on Friday Steve?

People are expecting the wrong things from Steve Southern. He's never been flash, just a respected work-horse with experience and a good attitude, which is why he was first candidate for captain.

As for the obsession with what people are getting paid, i just don't get it. Let's face it, whatever his salary is, he's hardly going to be retiring to a beach for his remaining years on the back of his WTW contract. I'm not party to what people are on, its unfair to speculate and ultimately i couldn't give a toss either.

Well said

Do we have a vice captain?

What role does he take?

Think it's kirmo, didn't he lead out players in london?