Totally agree, easily your best post.

What if o'brien is better than litten? If litten is good enough he'll come through. What if we'd never signed sneyd because he might have blocked the way for dean and tyson wilson? The club has to make decisions based on what they have now. I don't suppose they intended to sign a hooker but have (maybe) take an opportunity to acquire a highly regarded youngster. If we don't sign decent quality players we'd have the same group of people whinging about that too

100% this.

Lots of what ifs and it works both ways, personally I wouldn't sign him, but Radders is the boss and it's hard to argue with his recruitment. It looks like he has signed and I hope he turns out to be a useful signing.

I couldn't agree more.

What if tommy lee had turned out to be the best half back the city had ever produced, or reece dean, or HTW? The game is littered with promising kids who never make the grade and you can't build a club on potential. Even if he does come through, litten is at least 2, more likely 3 or 4 years off being ready for SL week in, week out. Houghton will get injured at some point and we'll be fighting to stay out of the middle 8's if we rely on washbrook and hadley as replacements

Things looking up ownership-wise at Bradford with rumours of new ownership by Wasps owner and players not already moved signed up; on that basis would look like O'Brien staying put.

But but, but, what a waste of space our club is for not signing him when we could

Suppose it's only a prospective deal at Bradford at the moment?
Can still see some more players leaving there.
Not averse to signing a hooker. We've been lucky Houghton has stayed fit for so long. Litten could be here long term, but isn't ready to step in week in week out just yet, should anything happen.

The players are all free agents as their former employer is no longer in existence. it will be down to personal choice if they decide to sign for a new co and obviously dependant on terms then an offer from them may be more attractive than one from us but I guess it depends on his loyalty and ambition and whether he's already signed a contract for us. Maybe we need to move some cap space on before we can register him?

As said it could work out, it could be a waste of cap, no body knows, happy with my views and stick my opinion.

Isn't there dispensation on the cap when such things happen?

On a side note, Clare has now signed for Leigh.

Don't think there is, I think players on the quota don't count though.

Big mistake by Leigh, didn't they know David Hodgson was available?

Ha!
When is Zook Ema being announced as Tilse's replacement?

www.totalrl.com/radford-says-hul ... d-players/

www.totalrl.com/radford-says-hul ... d-players/

O'Brien to Huddersfield. Shame, sounded like would have been a good fit for us.

there's a lot of sense in this. by the time a new bradford team gets round to recruiting they will have little to get from the player market. loaning them some of our younger players would give them more experience at a decent level rather than just in the academy or u23's

Has the Dual Reg agreement with Doncaster ended ?

Wouldnt be surprised if it has.
Hull pulled out of the agreement with York when the same coach was involved.

Disappointing IMO but hudds is next to bradford so he will likely have little travelling and hudds probably have a lot more room on their cap than we do so could probably offer him more.

Disco Dave was quite sprightly this aft!

Had a great game!

Then if we are having to sign external youngsters that shows us that the youth system coaches and the progression system is failing.
2012/13 we had 5 youth players come through to cement starting positions either straight away in crooks/Lineham and Shaul with the likes of Hadley/Bowden all making debuts in that time and being regular 1st 17 players.

Since then we've only had JA have a few starts, being overly criticised despite being expected to be top 4SL std when not having played ANY games for weeks and then only at fev AND only 20yrs of age.
Aside from JA's sporadic appearances and now not part of our set-up we've not had a single youth player come through in 3 full seasons, I'd say that was a concern given we've lost the tyson wilsons, Reece dean, Cunningham, Logan & Lancaster way down the pecking order due to signings, Litten a few seasons off by some people on here, Yes, Turgut and some of the other forwards may well get games this season but that 3 year gap/lack of the next wave coming through (& gaining experience) could be very telling. We can't keep signing from outside because it's more costly and it a blow to those youth players that thenm see little chance in getting a decent chance to progress even if they have the potential.

O Brien has signed for Huddersfield.

The system must have been failing then as well because Lineham was a buy in. Truth is youth development doesn't provide a steady drip feed of talent in any case - they come in fits and starts and not smoothly distributed over all positions. There is absolutely nothing wrong with recruiting "external" youngsters. Leeds, Wigan, Saints and Wire all do it - its just the closer geographic distances involved with them make it less obvious at times.