Re: Ryan & Bentley : Wed Aug 16, 2017 10:47 am
Bulliac wrote:
An alternative would be to stop chasing the 'big name' juniors; ie. the ones who are on the St Helens, leeds, Wigan etc watch list. We always make a big thing about taking juniors who were being 'courted' by the big clubs but these are exactly the ones who are most likely to depart when they hit open age. We'd be better off lowering our sights on these recruits and taking the ones who are not being chased by the SL clubs. There are plenty about and the chances are we'll still get some very decent players who will want to play for us.
You say there are plenty of young players about but this is not strictly true. The SL clubs(Bradford used to be included in this) literally sign up just about any member of the better clubs in the hope that they make it, can you then afford the resources to try and look for some rough diamonds? Your best bet will probably to do similar to Halifax and pick up SL clubs cast offs in the hope that you can pick up the odd decent one who can then progress to a decent championship(or SL with someone else) level. Not including Nick Rawsthorne who got snapped up by Hull as soon as he started to show any sort of talent, Fax have had 7 players who have played first team this season that got recruited in this way. 5 of those are first team regulars and 2 of those will probably end up back in SL if not next season then likely the season after.
