In fact, I think you'll find the trend reversing. There are a lot more people that have come to their senses about him over the last 12 months and can see that the kid is an important player in this team. He's recently been rewarded with an extension to his deal to, so it seems those at the club fall on my side of the argument, thankfully.

Brough is where he is now because of sheer talent that was glaringly obvious to anyone watching him in the early days. I never felt indifferent to him like I do to Westerman. He also addressed his underlying issues to allow his talent to flourish into the class player he is today. I've watched Westerman stay stagnant for 3 years, failing to get a grip of himself and sulking because he wasn't being played as he wanted to be. Captain? Mwahh ha ha!

Some of the criticism thrown at Westerman, people should be embarassed.

so when he was 21 he should have been the ultimate player? 3 years ago like name 1 British player at the age of 21 who got it all right? Name 1 British player at the age of 24 that gets it always right? Oh & grow up & support our players...all of them.

Are you hull fcs chief scout? Would make sense, and I blame you for everything haha, seriously though, you say I only see what I want to, so tell me when I'm watching Friday night, what should I be looking for in westermans game that makes you rate him so highly?

Sean o'loughlins style off role.

Hopefully, in his new role he'll have his hands on the ball more often so he can show us the skills we all know he has from his Cas days. But things you always get with Joe is passion, effort & commitment. He's always first man into the tackle and is constantly talking. He does a lot of donkey work when the teams on the back foot. He has an offload, clever late step the ability to catch out lazy defenders. He had impressive attacking stats last year without even being used as an attacking weapon.

The criticisms Joe gets most of all is the silly 'not professional' which I don't see how anyone outside the club could know and the 'He cost us £xxxxxxx' Those two I refuse to accept as legitimate.
The arguments around errors and penalties is valid, as there isn't a player in the game that [icouldn't[/i improve in this respect. But there are mitigating circumstances, especially when you're playing 80 minutes week in week out and for some strange reason you're being used as a crash forward.

What are you waffling on about? Ultimate at 21? No, you've lost me there, cherub.

As for support, I'll be yelling for Westerman in his black and white shirt same as all the other players. Like I do every - that's every - game. I just won't be expecting anything new from him, and will be holding my breath in tension every time someone passes to him in a dangerous position or he's asked to pull off a clean, strong tackle at a tense moment. I don't hate him, I just think he could do a lot better and he makes me nervous and unfailingly frustrated after he balls-up again. Seen nothing in pre-season to infer he's addressed these issues, but I'll give him every chance.

Haha please don't haha stop it, your killing me haha I hope you do only mean is role and are not comparing him to westerman, can't see westerman booming 30 yard passes out wide either way ever! Bet he as a blinder Friday night now, hope so, COYH

You said he has been stagnant for 3 years so he was 21 3 years ago...& his style as been the extra prop (gallen style) now he is a ball playing 13.. I didn't say he is Sean O did I? I just said his style..so keep up Derek (Ricky gervais style)

Over-egging it somewhat. Lee Richardson thinks he's bang average and totally over-rated, for example.

I don't think O'Loughlin does it as often as Westerman. May well come with experience, though, it wasn't until around the same age that O'Loughlin finally started to step out from the shadow of being Farrell's inferior brother-in-law. I'm just stating what I think he needs to improve, I fully believe he is capable of doing so. In the big games and the big moments, Wigan turn to O'Loughlin because they can trust him to choose and execute the right play. We can't say the same of Westerman yet, but hopefully we'll get there soon.

And I agree he's not really any more sloppy than most of his teammates (obviously some exceptions), I was meaning if he wants to attain O'Loughlin's sort of level. We are much sloppier as a team than Wigan.



I hope that's how it pans out.

I hope your, and I can't wait to see him in this new role. I honestly think you'll be saying this in another 3 years time, at the end of the day, it's a game of rugby and if he was as talented as you say, he should be bringing more to a game no matter what position he played, and theys plenty of other 2nd rowers with ball handling skills that manage to use them in that position. And lets not forget, he's a big lump of a lad, why shouldn't we having him crashing on to a ball out wide, oh I forget, he can't catch a ball fired at him at pace! Sorry, I can't help it hahaha

That's revisionist nonsense IMO. Brough was nowhere near the player he is now when with us. He was a great kicking game and a bit more potential in other areas of his game, but incapable of playing 80 minutes without blowing through his backside, and it was Cooke who organised the team. It wasn't until Wakefield that he really started to consistently look the part.

Never said he was. I said he had raw talent that was obvious to see. He was immature and also had disciplinary issues, but as I said, I was dismayed when he left, knowing he'd be back to bite us. Credit, he learnt his lesson, addressed his weaknesses and is what he is now.

Why is it no-one seems to be able to do that at Hull? That is the underlying issue at our club and, lo and behold, we have Radford in the paper before the season's kicked off, bemoaning the lifestyle choices of some of our players.

Changed your view, it seems.

I still disagree. He showed the raw talent of a great kicking game, but nothing else exceptional. His ball-handling was competent but nothing special, his running game was not at all evident as to how good it could be because he simply wasn't fit enough, and we never saw his organisational skills because as I said, Cooke did it all for us.



Brough himself has said being cut loose by us was his turning point, so realistically we still wouldn't have got the Brough of now even if we'd kept him. He needed the shock of being binned and then having time in the championship to work at his game.

That was 2 years ago. The issue is, Westerman hasn't kicked on and has stagnated, sadly like most of our young prospects do. (Praying Lineham and Crooks buck this trend.)

Well, we'll disagree. I thought he showed his potential as a rugby brain and ability to direct in addition to his kicking game.

I do agree with your latter point. What is it about our club that engenders this mindset of low expectation? Watch Briscoe get MOS next year.

Genuine question; when did he show the ability to direct a team? Cooke ran pretty much everything about us when Brough was here, and what he didn't Swain did.

I'm not saying Brough didn't show promise, or even that I wasn't disappointed to see him go, but I do think that it's a case of 20/20 hindsight with him. At the time it was far from obvious or clear to anyone that he would become as good as he has. He could just as easily have been a Tommy Lee/Jamie Ellis type of story.

Westerman gets more criticism for his errors and missed tackles because of the circumstances they tend to happen in. Alot of his errors come as a result of him trying something that just isn't on. I don't mind an error if the percentages were in your favour and it was the right play but you just didn't quite manage to execute it. Making an error because you've made a bad decision (again) is what annoys me anyway. It's a similar thing with his missed tackles, if he missed a tackle through being shattered then that's understandable but deciding to go for a big hit and missing then leaving a big hole is again what annoys me.

Some of the criticism is over the top but then so is some of the defence especially talk of him being a future FC great etc. If he has a fantastic season I'll happily eat humble pie but I really dont see it happening.

He conceded 16 penalties in 27 games last season, Rich Whiting conceded 13 in 26. Not a massive difference. Not forgetting Westerman plays more minutes. Presumably you think Whiting's penalties weren't as bad?

As for tackles, Westeman completed 790 and missed 49 (94%). Whiting completed 644 and missed 33 (95%).

Brough was average for Hull, great kickign game and defence, but didn't have the passing or running game like he has now, his best games for Hull were at hooker IMO.

He has really worked hard on and off the filed to improve his game to become the best halfback in the league.

Sums him up perfectly for me.
Stats are fine but stats don't paint the full picture, stuff like the area of the pitch, the tackle count when a penalty is conceded etc. Giving a penalty away on the 1st tackle in your own 20 is nowhere near as detrimental as giving a penalty away on the 4th in your opponents 20.