Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 1:44 pm  

St. Rughead wrote:

Moa's not the only one. There's plenty of players who've come to 'lesser teams' in SL that we would have benefited from, in recent years. L. Paea, Mika, Taia, Heremaia, Manuokafoa, Sammutt, Hanbury, Poore, Kaufusi, McDonnell, Kearney, Lulia, Burns, the list goes on...

No dont agree with most of them.
Obviously Hanbury and Sammut stand out like sore thumbs,especially comparing them to Lance.
Maybe Manuokafoa and Poore at a push but the rest meh.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 1:48 pm  

Dudson, Taylor and Flower have been decent signings at Wigan.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 4:01 pm  

If you look at it on paper, some of it hasn't been too bad.

It's turned out that way on the field mind but for example im 90% certain Perry played SOO the season before we signed him. I'm not having it there were many complaints when we brought in a SOO prop forward.

Same with world cup winning fullback Lance Hohaia, it was only Saddened really who, rightly, called it.

On paper the two that get the most scrutiny(deservedly so) at the time didn't IMO look like bad options. It just didn't materialise. I have it on good account that Perry is the highest earner at the club, and i'm guessing Hohaia and Laffranchi are up there. With hopefully 2 of these 3 gone in the offseason I hope we can put it right.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 5:10 pm  

Letting Pryce go and bringing in Hohaia a massive mistake that shouldn't have been made. Yes, Pryce had been through a nightmare period of injuries in the 18 months leading up to his departure, but he's done very well for Catalans, and has stayed relatively injury free (I think).

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 5:22 pm  

Carlos Alberto wrote:

Letting Pryce go and bringing in Hohaia a massive mistake that shouldn't have been made. Yes, Pryce had been through a nightmare period of injuries in the 18 months leading up to his departure, but he's done very well for Catalans, and has stayed relatively injury free (I think).

Letting Pryce go was exactly the right decision IMO. At the time he had hardly played in two seasons and then wanted a longer contract than we were prepared to give him. He has stayed relatively injury free in France but that could have gone either way and they took a chance on him. I'm glad we didn't.

It was right that we gave Lomax and Gaskell an opportunity in the halves as they were both home grown halfbacks who had been on the fringes for a while, particularly Lomax. That neither has worked out as a halfback is unfortunate but clearly how it is. In the meantime we have let two other halfbacks go. We may well have an up and coming halfback awaiting a debut but whether they will get any game time this season I don't know. We will probably just go out and buy some unknown antipodean.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 6:29 pm  

It must be the Easter weekend , but one again I find myself in agreement with SaintsFan . We let Pryce go for good reason he was dogged by serious injury and resigning him would of been a gamble.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 6:49 pm  

brook40 wrote:

It must be the Easter weekend , but one again I find myself in agreement with SaintsFan . We let Pryce go for good reason he was dogged by serious injury and resigning him would of been a gamble.

It was a decision I think most of us could understand at the time. Personally I was gutted as I think he's still one of the best attacking players in Super League at the moment, but his injury record was a big concern.

What you don't do though is let a player go when you've not got a player coming in to replace them. At that stage we didn't know how Gaskell and Lomax would go. It all then goes completely pear shaped with the signing of Lance Hohaia.

It just seems to me that we sign overseas players in the same way you would employ someone in a business environment. You look at their CV as proof of their ability. It explains the signings of Perry, Laffranchi and Hohaia perfectly. All of them have outstanding CVs. Perry had won 2 NRL Grand Finals, played 211 times in the NRL, most as starting prop, played 5 times for County then progressed to play 3 times for New South Wales in Origin and played 4 times for Australia.

Anthony Laffranchi had played 204 times in the NRL scoring 50 tries. He'd won a Grand Final and scored the winning try in an Origin game. He played 4 times for County and 4 times for New South Wales. He also played 5 times for Australia and regularly topped 40 tackles, including in an Origin game.

Lance Hohaia played 185 times for New Zealand Warriors, played in an NRL Grand Final and is a World Cup winner.

You cannot argue with those CVs, they are top class. Had someone with a little rugby knowledge looked at the players in depth however, they would have seen how poor and unsuitable the players were for the recruitment needs we had at the time. Josh Perry had suffered a couple of serious injuries and was on his way down, struggling a lot in his final season in the NRL. Laffranchi was a player who had played his entire career in the backrow. He was signed and asked to play as a prop forward despite not being big enough, hard working enough or strong enough mentally to do the job to a decent standard. Lance Hohaia is perhaps the most costly mistake we've made with our recruitment. He primarily played fullback for New Zealand Warriors, played a year at centre, filled in at hooker for a season or two. He played fullback for New Zealand and occasionally hooker from the bench. One position he almost never played despite his utility value was half back. Yet we sign him to play there. It's three bizarre recruitment decisions that mystify and frustrate the fans and I don't believe anyone with any rugby knowledge was involved in any of the decisions.

I get a lot of stick on here for criticising players, but those three are probably in the top 4 earners at the club and contribute very little value.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 7:05 pm  

If you remember 3 to 4 years ago Mc Manus made a club statement that the policy or model for the club was to promote success through the youth within the club. This by nature mean,t Rush had more responsibilty and pressure to deliver and develop the younger players within the club. This adopted policy also gave Mc Manus the opportunity to tighten the purse strings on contracts transferring expenditure to the new stadium.

This is where problems manifested itself, we lost the culture within the club once the last of the immortals (Cunningham) hung up his boots, we also lost a possible 5 year half back partnership with Eastmond and Wheeler.
A Lomax and Gaskell partnership looked a possibiilty in 2011, but its taken 3 coaches to realise that lack of creativity was not a recipe for success.

The days of signing a top class half back from OZ/NZ are now gone, perhaps the club has hit this obstacle first and need to find the right formula, because I,m sure most of the other superleague clubs will experience the same sooner than later.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 7:23 pm  

Judder Man wrote:

The days of signing a top class half back from OZ/NZ are now gone

Did they ever start? I can't think of many established NRL half backs that moved to an English club, even if you go back years. The only ones that came over were troubled individuals (Who will still be coming).

The younger NRL players who aren't getting a shot in the team because of the outstanding players ahead of them are the ones we need to be looking at. The next Scott Dureau or the next Michael Dobson. They will still be there.

Re: McManus - Squad - Half Backs : Sat Mar 30, 2013 8:09 pm  

There is no doubt we are lacking at half back and a good scrum half we see us challenge for a trophy. I feel we have to be very careful. Matty Smith was not the answer at Saints and still wouldn't be, he would not be the maverick scrum half we need. Saints don't seem to have the same attacking structure as Wigan. At Wigan their attack is very robotic, but highly effective and Matty Smith fits into that structure well, he is not an off the cuff maverick scrum half that we need. Saints style is different, we have tried this attacking structure rubbbish, the best scrum halfs at Saints have not been robots ala Matty Smith, but off the cuff, play what is in front of them, natural scrum halfs, natural rl players like Goulding, Holding and Long. Smith fits in well with the structures at Wigan, we have no structure! Our tries will tend to be off the cuff efforts like Makinson's or barge overs due to weight of possession such as Meli's and Clough's on Friday. Once we identify that player, whoever it may be I have no idea we will be a strong side. Imagine a Bobby Goulding with Willie Manu, Puletua and Soliola running off him, they would have field day. That is the type of scrum half we need.