Still think Sharp could have been good for us....got sacked for a damn sight less than what Agar is doing.

Cooke once told me that he rated Peter Sharp as the best coach during his time at Hull FC.

That run in 2006 was excellent and he did well in 2007 to take us to 4th despite losing our playmaker through no fault of his own. What let Sharp down was some of his recruitment.

You'll get very few on here admitting to it, but King looked a class above 3 of our props last night. The original signing of and subsequent extension of contract of Cussack was such a crass decision it's not true. If we had more pace and better ball players in the front row you could maybe understand it, but we don't. So cussack is a huge regret for me.

Now I await the normal Kingy liked a pint and a fag mob - so what. Watch the game again last night, he was first receiver some times for Wakey, passing the ball either way, always made ground and has an offload to boot. Now watch any game of Cussack and tell me honestly (putting the moral high ground to one side) that not retaining King, getting rid of cussack and getting a quota 3/4 was just plain daft.

No Cussack = No Fitz?

I thought he had a decent game against you guys the other week to.

King had a very good game last night. He occasionally had a very good game for us. Usually in the run up to contract negotiations. The rest of the time he had become largely average on the pitch and part of our problems off it. Had to go IMO.

Cusack looks to be playing a season too far to me. I'd personally have preferred not to have either him OR King this season. I believe there were other reasons behind retaining Cusack however.

Agree on the King instead of Cusack, said that a few weeks back

Peter Sharp was unlucky in some ways and certainly got sacked for much less than the idiot that we have now but you are 100% correct in criticising his recruitment. I would go as far as to say that it was absolutely shocking !

I remember at that time having countless arguments on here about Cusack, Byrne, Dykes etc.. as signings to take us to that next level. His recruitment was as bad as it gets for a club like ours and his retention was probably worse. He just had to go.

However, I honestly don't know if I would swap him for Agar ?? Not the greatest choice in the world.

Amen to that. If Sharp had had as much time given to him that Agar had lavished on him, I think our position may well have been very different. I think he was ultimately made the scapegoat for the decline in form following the departure of our only genuine playmaker at the time but not given chance or the manpower to try and recover the situation. Academic now though.

Someone earlier in the post mentioned about losing Tickle and how to replace him. Have we not got the perfect replacement for Tick Tick in Richard Whiting ?? The lad might finally get the chance to nail down a position regularly. I dunno whether he'd need to gain weight but he's exactly the kind of gifted ball player who many shout that we need in the midfield. We haven't had this since Shane McMenemy left the club.

100% agree. King, on occasion, looked like a top class prop but in the other 95% of games he was nothing more than average. The re-signing of Cusack was a very poor decision and when you compare our props to those of the top sides, we are carrying two or possibly three that none of them would even consider signing.

The front row for me, has been a problem since 2005 and the contract extensions of Radford, Dowes and Cusack have been such poor decisions by Sharp and Agar that is has left us with a very ineffective front row, even with the exceptional efforts of O'Meley and Moa.

It's fair enough to question some of his signings but I don't think you label them all as poor. What we don't know is whether he was actually able to sign the players he really wanted to. By that I mean what kind of cash was available ? Maybe his hands were tied with what he could spend. We signed Dykes, who when fit, was a superb player. I wonder whether he was a compromise though with being someone who had the requisite skill but not having the funds to spend on someone who was of the right age and fitness record.

Sharp lost some great players in his first year or so, in some cases, through no fault of his own, but didn't he show McMenemy the door soon after arriving ?

The outstanding memory that I have of Sharp, around 2006, was when he identified everything that our squad lacked which then led to us being linked with a number of absolute top drawer signings in all of those areas. He then went on to sign a load of players that just weren't what we wanted or needed and then handed out lengthy contracts to the dross that we should have been releasing at the first chance.

IMHO, Peter Sharp's tenure took our squad backwards at break-neck speed and it still hasn't recovered.

His recruitment and retention at that time was more than poor but if "his hands were tied" as you put it, surely he should have just walked rather than put himself in such a vulnerable position ?

As for Dykes, his signing was nothing short of a pi$$-take. Prior to his signing, he had broken down in matches and in training with groin tears, calf tears and knee problems to name just a few and it was very obvious to all that his body was just no longer upto the rigors of top class rugby league. That's with the exception of Peter Sharp of course who thought it would be a good idea to give him what was probably a very lucrative deal for two seasons.

Cusack's signing came on the back of us being linked with all the world's best props and to call it underwhelming was an understatement.

As for Todd Byrne, for christ sake, never has such a below average player in all departments commanded a quota spot at a so-called top club. (Apart from Matt Sing of course)

Wasn't McMenemy released through injury ? Not sure if he was in his final year anyway. I know what you mean about long contracts and dross but unlike Agar, Sharp didn't have the time to try and finish his work in progress. The outstanding thing that sticks in my mind was the release of Briscoe but from what I have read, I think that might have been as much to do with being held to ransom and bad advice on Briscoe's half. A coach can declare his interest in anyone he likes but if he doesn't have the financial backing he's shafted. This is a symptom of our club and has been for many years. We've needed better players in key areas and none of the the last three coaches have been able to to sign them. Whether the problem is availability, funds, geography or Hull not being a fashionable club I don't know. We've certainly missed out on signing good players over the years because of Hull being where it is.

IMO Sharp was a good coach

but signings like Sing (past it) Byrne (never had it) Maivia (need I say more) Dykes (sicknote) completely wrecked it for him.

in the mean time key players like Cooke, Swain, Mcmenemy, Domic, Brough all left.

Tickle and Manu were just about his only good signings. I'm on the fence about Berrigan as due to the team being poor and him having injury problems we haven't seen the best of him.

Would you walk out on your livelihood in a similar position ? I don't think I would. Principles are fine but they don't pay the mortgage !



Maybe so but sometimes these do come off. Spectacularly not in our case !! And the same can be said so far for this season with another ageing scrum half with a poor recent fitness record . . . .



Again we can be linked with anybody, cost is the issue and whether those available would come to the club. You couldn't fault Cusack's pedigree though, done it all at the top level in the NRL. You don't stay in a good side without being a decent player.



I quite liked the look of Todd Byrne, he did a job and I thought he did ok. Whether you'd want to spend a quota spot on a player like him is a different matter. Matt Sing is a given !!

Thing is, nobody is going to a job that satisfies everyone unless you spend like Wigan did in the '80s. Compromises have to be made. Where they get made is where folk differ.

Couldn't agree more !

Tickle and Manu turned out to be excellent signings and were indeed the exceptions to Sharp's very poor recruitment.

Sing, Dykes, Maiava, Byrne, Cusack were all very poor signings by him for different reasons and TBH, the signing of Berrigan hasn't really turned out to be that great. He had massive shoes to fill but hasn't, IMO, even come close.

No regrets on any of them. Lee might have developed but I didn't fancy waiting another 200 games to find out. 3 or 4 more to go this year I hope. Players who can't hack the responsibility of putting in 110% every week and who let their team mates down with regular basic errors would be at the top of my list, followed by retirees and quota changes.

If that was the case the club really need to understand how to prioritise. The coach is the single biggest influence on the squad, so you pay what you need to there and whatever you're then short comes off the playing staff.

Don't doubt that but it doesn't mean he was a good signing. He never really let the side down but I'll never be convinced that we needed to import a player of his standard, using up an overseas spot and likely earning a relatively inflated wage. For those reasons he was further evidence of Sharp's dodgy recruitment.

Forgot Josh Hodgson, who is the best thing since sliced bread on the east side. If we end up losing Houghton, this could prove to be a mistake.

Todd Byrne would have made a decent winger if we used his best asset, his ability to take a high ball, For years I have seen how dangerous Pat Richards can be in these situations and wondered why we never used this tactic more often considering we have also had two of the best wingers in the world under the bomb in Blacklock and Sing.

Dykes was a better signing then Long has been up to now in my opinion, but I dont think there is a case for Sharpes recruitment as it was pretty poor.

Indeed.

Without a shadow of doubt a future international.