I did post a few weeks ago that Jacob Hookem had been offered a contract by Castleford but was unsure if he ever signed it or not. When Tony Smith became coach i wondered if he would change his mind and stay but Radford must have persuaded him where his future lies.

I agree Dave but tbf Houghtons wages won't be on the cap anyways so I can understand why he's on a roling contract

Its a shame if Hookem has signed for Cas as would have liked to have seen him given a chance at Hull, but after the way he was treated by BH I can understand why he may feel his future is away from Hull. That said with the club recruiting Truman and Clifford as our halfs and the likes of Ben McNamara and Lovodua realistically Hookems chances of first team games would be limited in the halfs. The same at 9 with the likes of Houghton, Dwyer, Balmforth and again Lovodua as cover his chances would be limited.

Think we’ve done well to do the business we have, given the constraints.
The real change in personnel won’t happen until we get the cap room next year (which will be substantial).
Hopefully the change in culture that a proven head coach brings will be the major positive, and is better than any signing.
I’m not expecting miracles next season. Just hope the club pulls together, and the fans can start to feel positive again (win or lose).

If we made sixth but could say that we competed in every game that would do for me next year.

Maybe get a bit of luck with the Cup draw.

Agree that all things considered we have to be looking at 6th place as a minimum, whilst we aren't going to win every week we have to at the very least be competing week in week out for 80mins, no more shellacking's and an improvement in pts for and against and more than anything we do not down tools after mid season.

6th place minimum is a bridge too far IMO. Top 4,will be Saints, Wigan, Hudds and Catalan. I expect Wire to be up there plus His Bobness reckons Dobbins have become the top team in Hull


Can see us scrapping it out with Cas and Salford for the also rans, unless of course Bobs is wrong

If Taylor & Griffin can return anywhere near their best, the squad looks okayish, but like any year, we will need a bit of luck with injuries. Like has been said before, the front row and half backs look good, outside backs a bit less so and the back row again, gambling on fitness , may be okay.
I do think with a proven head coach and players looking for new deals, we may see this squad surprising a few. I know Huddersfield look strong as do Wire, but clubs that were well coached last season worked out Huddersfield's relentless process, process , process and Daryll Powell seems a very polarising coach, having apparently had a squad rebellion last season so I am hopeful, not expectant, that we can do well with what we have. I certainly don't envisage feeling as apathetic and cheated as I did under BH.

The way that BH treated him, grow up. Because he’s come through the Hull academy fans act like he’s gods gift. The reality is, he’s had chances and hasn’t taken any of them. BH has set up the academy pathway and brought in some exciting youth which will allow Tony Smith to excel.

The reality is Hookem is a hooker/ Half but for Hooker is behind Houghton, Dwyer, Lovodua, Balmforth, (probably Rutland)

And for half he’s behind Clifford, Trueman, McNamara, Lovodua, Hoy (probably similar stature in squat to Rutland and Harman).

1. Why keep someone who’s never shown enough to step up.
2. In a salary cap sport you look at younger players and they obviously offer just as much or more in the clubs opinion.
3. It’s obviously not just the leadership group with a bad attitude, we have academy players like Ferreira with bad attitudes. His mum was constantly slagging the club off on social media stating Jude should be in the first team playing every week but only managed about 11 games for a poor London Broncos side

Didn't take his chances, what chances was that, he played 4 games

Sub against Warrington and Rovers (played 5 minutes)
and against Leeds and Wigan, games which 60 points was put against us.

Is that the right environment to show what he can do?

Hookem was getting good gametine at Whitehaven, Hodgson called him back when we had no halfbacks to not play him and play Johnstone at 7 against Toulose at home, that would have been the type of to show what he can do.

Played underperforming players like Reynolds, Johnstone and Gale, rather than give Hookem a chance.

Maybe he won't make it, but to say he got a fair chance and didn't take his chances is total nonsense.

Grow Up!!! Really? I'm grown up thanks though not sure sure you are with such an immature response. Your assumption that fans act like he's god gift is laughable. People are allowed an opinion and a viewpoint just like yourself,

To pick up on your point about Hookem having chances and not taken them, I suppose sitting on a bench for most of if not all of an 80 min game is a great opportunity for a player or being overlooked for players massively underperforming week in week out. For me it was BH himself that had the opportunity to give the academy players game time but so many times he would rather have flogged an aging Houghton for 80mins, use underperforming players constantly and go with an unused bench spot. So as I said I can understand why a young player may feel they are better off leaving.

The less said about BH tenure the better as its seems pretty clear that he had no control and wasn't able to stamp any authority on the players and the attitudes sucked from top to bottom, hence he was removed and Tony Smith brought in.

A coach get sacked and so you just want to blame everything on him and no give him credit where it’s due.

Was Hookem not a full time professional who trained week in week out. And yet he still couldn’t get any game time. He had 0 game time but whilst he was on the pitch he missed 1 in 6 tackles without any fatigue. Tony smith doesn’t seem bothered about keeping him either.

Hodgson picked up Gardner and Laidlow from playing amateur rugby and gave them game time. Think that shows he wasn’t against giving game time to those who deserved it. Add to the Kye Armstrong, Charlie Severs, Balmforth, Davy Litten and Harvey Barron.

You’ve made a decision that Hookem is good enough to play off 4 appearances in which he had limited game time and was pretty anonymous when on the pitch.

Harvey Barron and Darnell McIntosh are good example of our fan base picking players they like and don’t like. Fans rave over Barron and if McIntosh was in his position in the wakey & HKR game we probably beat wakey and who knows against rovers. (I’m not saying he’s not got a future but he’s not ready yet). Fans still refuse to accept that and were criticising AP, a fan himself, for getting frustrated at his errors.

McIntosh on the other hand came off a bad injury and was pretty steady and our top try scorer. But because he dropped the ball in the derby (which went back) fans turned on him and every error after was in the spot light.

I’m fed up of fans wanting to just stick the knife in BH, he came, he wasn’t successful and he’s gone now. But that doesn’t mean everything going on in the club was his fault.

I don't think I have seen anything like what you're suggesting, on this forum, and nobody said everything was BH's fault, but it was fairly obvious he'd lost the dressing room and fans in turn criticised the players who couldn't be bothered, not just the coach. That said, Gale & Reynolds were his signings and it seemed as though he picked them more in hope than expectation that they'd come good - and they didn't. I would imagine the decision to terminate Reynolds' contract early was directly from AP, who was probably livid that the club had spent way over big money on a player who the coach himself had endorsed, and who fans rightly questioned when his signing was announced. Anyone who watches Fox or SKY could have told AP that this was more than a risky signing, the guy had hardly played in three years, yet BH heralded him on the reputed largest contract ever awarded a player in our history. When you look at some of the players we have had, that beggars belief!!!
A lot of what went wrong was directly due to Hodgson and equally a set of underperforming , highly paid players.

But the club still have to pay his money

Which will certainly be close to 100,000 a year

Disagree as Leeds and Salford have proven it doesn't take much to challenge

Leeds were awful last season until rohan Smith took over

Only saints and Wigan have been top level consistent last 2 or 3 years catalan decent but certainly beatable

I'm not blaming everything on BH and I haven't seen anyone suggesting such but the reality was his tenure was abject failure, with a team that was seemingly so fractured and poor attitude all round. Yes the players were pro players and the senior/leadership group should know better however as a Head Coach there is a responsibility in that role which certainly was not met.

I never said Hookem was good enough or not either way that's your incorrect assumption, I simply stated that its a shame he is leaving as it would have been good to see how he went if given a chance under Tony Smith, as under BH I don't think Hookem was really given a decent chance but thats sport.

As for giving the youngsters you mentioned game time they were hardly giving much, Barron and Laidlaw the ones that got the most which was more out of circumstance than planned opportunity. Armstrong, Severs, Balmforth and Litten hardly played.

As for fans sticking the knife in to BH again I don't see that, all I see is fans stating the obvious and facts of what was witnessed week in week out and the same mistakes being made over and over again.

Unfortunately whilst BH is a nice guy as a head coach at Hull he failed and by some margin as results and performances showed.

Re hookem.,
No one on here knows for sure how he was treated.
If indeed, he leaves for Cas then TS must also be comfortable with that… so does that tell you something?
salary cap !
we can’t keep every player.
It’s recognised that the squad need a back row forward.
To enable that to happen then players currently on the books will have to leave

Might not need a second rower given the size Carlos has put on up top.

But these "performances" the same players are still here and was here when they did the same under radford

Houghton, taylor, Griffin, Carlos, shaul, Lane, fash still here from 2018 wakey Warrington record hammerings etc

we going to blame Smith another coach?

It's the players not the coach

So what was BH doing as the Head Coach & KP as his assistant? His tenure was unfortunately an abject failure in dealing with long standing issues we had seen even under Radford such as poor discipline, poor basic skill set, unable to put 80min performances in, players under performing week in week out and these are just a few on a long list.

The players are far from blameless but unfortunately the Head Coaches main responsibility is the performance and results of the first team and for me it was evident BH was way out of his depth and simply had no authority over the group and we had the tail wagging the dog. There was no responsibility or accountability and it would seem BH was either too nice a guy or just not strong enough to take to task certain players who continually dished up one poor performance after another.

However all this is old news and we have now had a major overhaul of the coaching and conditioning/fitness set up, AP has brought in an experienced head coach with a proven track record which has been needed. Hopefully the changes made will see an improvement in performances and attitude, time will tell.

Nowhere near 100k

Pretty obvious Warrington don't want Longstaff looking at the squad numbers. I'd take him as a 3rd backrow option

but does Tony Smith want him?

And do we have the cap for him, if I had the choice of him or no one I'd take Longstaff, but I'd rather go wiry what we have and see who becomes available, lacks size and power (both I attack and defence), if Savelio is out a backrow of Lane, Longstaff and Cator would be far too small.

Always been massive has Carlos, could do well in the backrow IMO, got size, strength and defence, would mean one of Mitch, Wynne, Scott or Griffin to play centre though, are any of them good enough to play centre regularly?