With the exception of Mariano (whom I would have preferred to keep) I don't think any of those are regular SL players anywhere. So why should Rovers retain players that no other SL club deem good enough to play? If they were good enough they would have been snapped up elsewhere. Even regular cannon fodder like Leeds haven't signed them.

Maybe they would have been had they been given a shot at SL. It seems odd for you to think the responsibility for giving a shot to Rovers youth players lies with other clubs.

Who is to say Beaumont, Cox, Taylor or Sheriff will become SL regulars? Nobody knows until they are given the chance.

Smokey, as usual, your arguments have no element of quality control in them. A year ago you were telling us that replacing I'Anson with Blake Green was a "like for like swap". Green was POTY, whilst I'anson is looking forward to a career with Swinton. ATEOTD, Rovers have to give their customers what they want as a priority. That means putting a competitive team out on the park. Player development will be done for Rovers benefit, the national team is not our responsibility. If it were we wouldn't have that clown as coach.

What a poor effort. I've said many times, and started critical threads on this very fact. FC's youth development and failure to give a player a debut in 2011 is a disgrace, pure and simple, and mainly due to Agar's short term preservationist strategy. Unacceptable. Despite this, we've 7 or 8 overseas players on our books, not 11, and I think we should really limit this to 5. Martin is a poor signing (again which I've commented on critically) and I'd very much hope he doesn't keep a player like Turner or Whiting out of the team. Rovers are improving their academy, for sure, but will still probably have a starting 17 with a majority of non-British players in 2012, that's going into your 6th season. The difference between us, as ever, is that I feel comfortable criticising FC in areas of weakness and what are, IMO, policies and practices that are not to be glossed over. Rovers fans by and large feel unable to critique the fact that 6 years on 11 overseas players is probably a few too many, given that Hudgell signed up for 5 in 2007.

I never said they will. But your logic is sound, players will not become regular SL players without playing SL regularly although I would imagine that that's patently obvious to most people. Thanks for that anyway

Defo agree with u stan on that last comment

Surely your time would be better served over on the Hull FC board then.

I count only 10 overseas players for Rovers. No doubt when if it becomes official about Mcdonnell and Mika and the departure of Misi it will be 11. Still we have 10 overseas players after 6 years of SL and Hull have 8 overseas players after 15 years.

Kind of sucks being you doesn't it?

2007 was a long time ago in SL development terms. Lets look at the changing landscape; a move from 12 to 14 teams. This has diluted the player pool significantly and put simply, their isn't enough British talent to go around. Then there is the Crusaders experiment implosion to deal with. Withers & O'Hara was a situation nobody saw coming, but we would have been foolish to ignore this. Not many teams have failed to take someone on this exemption.

Providing Rovers continue to give the likes of Taylor, Cox & Sheriff a fair crack at the 1st team, I'm comfortable with the club's policy.

Dont worry she booked in at spec savers with me

(1)Kris Welham
(2) Jordan Cox
(3) Liam Watts
(4) Louis Sheriffe
(5) Scott Taylor
(6) Aaron Ollett
(7) Rhys Lovegrove
(icon_cool.gif Scott Murrell
(9) Liam Salter
(10) Nick Johnson
(11) Sam Latus
(12) Rich Beaumont
(13) Chris Heil
(14) James Green
This is our full homegrown list. Discounting Lovegrove and Murrell If we can see six of that list regularly getting game time that would be an awesome effort for 2012.

It was a like for like swap, one untried mid-twenties reserve player for another untried mid-twenties reserve player. Maybe if I'anson had been given a proper shot at first team before he was 23 he would have been able to forge a career at SL level.

How many british players who otherwise would have been at HKR did Crusaders take out of the player pool?

They would need to start and actually give them a shot for them to continue to do so.

Between them they played 28 games last season.

Thats just pathetically disingenuous and you know it.

Not at all. I can see FC's faults and am big enough to discuss them without the need for knee-jerk and myopic defence of things that are patently not right. We are 3 over the quota numbers agreed in 2007 and this is disappointing. You are 6 over and either don't care or feel some strange need to defend it as an irrelevance. That's the difference between us, I suppose. By your logic I guess, Widnes should have 15 overseas players. Guess what? They have less than Rovers. Oh dear.

Strange need to defend it, Lets see if you can dig up a post where I defend our recruitment policy?
I simply can't see how you can comment after your team have had 10 more years in super league and have a massive total of 2 less overseas players then ourselves. It's shoddy from both clubs.

Agreed.

I will forgive you as you won't have seen I'Anson play much, but our coaching staff were right out of turd polish, hence his release. Interesting that Widnes had a similar stock out of the same item.

Not forgetting of course that this is the same I'Anson who was dumped by his previous club following a serious leg injury and after not really being given a fair crack at a first team spot who we than magnanimously picked up and gave a fair crack at Super League to.

Which team was that?

Leeds.

Same team that Scott Murrell was at.

I omitted that bit Sands, but then again, I'm not going to even attempt to knock Leeds junior pathway, its something we should aspire towards.

It does help if you have the resources to hoover up any and pretty much every promising junior in the country.

The fact HKR were needing to ‘polish a turd’ in I’anson is HKR’s fault.

To borrow a joke from physics - that argument only works for a spherical Hull KR in a vacuum. We'd still be in the second tier if we'd have invested in youth instead of the first team.





What has left us so far behind Australia is the size of the sport here compared to there. We're so far [iahead[/i of France for a similar reason. It's unpalatable, but there are no silver-bullets that will significantly change the balance - it's were it is for some very good and, frankly, obvious reasons. Now that isn't to say we shouldn't try - but denial and fantasy, while making a lovely comfort blanket, are not helpful.



Yep. Even I think the implementation of the non-fed rule has become a joke. The new Crusaders and Heremaia/Dobson dispensations have given us 3 extra overseas players, and I can't make that argument with a straight face anymore. It's not my job or investment on the line, but as an established SL club, I think we should have gone into 2012 with a couple fewer. I think there is some value in the non-fed rule, but for rather different reasons to you.



We've been lucky. We've benefitted more than most. Sometimes life deals you a decent hand. It has helped make Rovers a mid-ranking SL club very quickly. I'm a club-first parochialist... but England RL was not significantly harmed in the making of this movie. These threads are small price to pay.



The extent to which [ithe club[/i has [isought[/i dispensations is exaggerated, IMO. Lovegrove, fair enough. But nobody will complain if fellow British passport holders Laurence Pearce and George Griffin get dispensations, I assume. Mason's dispensation was necessary because Tonga had a nervous breakdown, but let's count that too. The rest were universal. Now, we haven't run away from them either, but I see no shame in playing a good hand.
Just for clarification - you'd be happy to go with the 5 overseas players you list, even while other clubs benefit from the dispensations, as a moral 'stand', despite the likely sporting and economic consequences? Or only if all SL clubs reduce to 5, something that would probably be of relative benefit to Hull FC?







Sorry - call me cynical.

Neither Scott Murrell, I’anson weren’t given a shot because of overseas players, neither could get in to the side and neither got a shot because they weren’t the best young british player at the club. You cant criticise a club for having more young british players than they can accommodate and use it as a defence of a club which doesn’t have enough.