: Mon Mar 30, 2009 1:40 pm  

Castleford at the moment are proving the licence system right, they would have been relegated and now they are doing very well. Will it last? Who knows, but you can't doubt that they are stronger this year round.

Celtic aren't a bad side, they have had some very close results and practically had their pre-season wiped out.

I personally don't think Salford recruited enough in the close season and are relying on alot of players who played last season. The players they do have though will learn this year and be better next year, in theory!

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 2:01 pm  

chubbs1981 wrote:

of course this wont set off the widness fans at all will it.

No.

AJ Viking wrote:

Castleford at the moment are proving the licence system right, they would have been relegated and now they are doing very well. Will it last? Who knows, but you can't doubt that they are stronger this year round.

Celtic aren't a bad side, they have had some very close results and practically had their pre-season wiped out.

I personally don't think Salford recruited enough in the close season and are relying on alot of players who played last season. The players they do have though will learn this year and be better next year, in theory!

Stories of widespread bitter Widnes fans are grossly overstated on this site.

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 2:03 pm  

Catalancs wrote:

Salford have an average crowd of 4,863 from three matches, while Widnes have an average of 3,842 after the same amount of games.
Salford's average was helped greatly by the large travelling support from Wigan.

Spot on. The fans Wigan brought helped bump up our figures enormously. So did the thousands that Celtic and Quins brought in our other home games this season. Admittedly our attendance is crap but if you're going to throw your travelling support in to twist statistics then add the others as well.

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 2:37 pm  

chubbs1981 wrote:

of course this wont set off the widness fans at all will it.

Nobody mentioned Widnes fans.............apart from you just then.

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 4:03 pm  

Basically I think Salford are burdened this year with too many NL1 standard players.
When we were relegated in 2007 all contracts were null and void so the club had to sign up players again for NL1 who would not take one year deals. Castleford had the same kind of problem last year but now appear much stronger since they got shut of the dead wood and recruited new players.

Perhaps it would have been a better idea if the RFL had made all contracts null and void for players of clubs that won a franchise from NL1. It just seems to work one way in the players favour and not the clubs for me?

IMO there are far better quality reserve squad players at other clubs than Salford have in their first team this year.

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 4:12 pm  

theredshed wrote:

Perhaps it would have been a better idea if the RFL had made all contracts null and void for players of clubs that won a franchise from NL1. It just seems to work one way in the players favour and not the clubs for me?

Apart from when the team gets relegated.

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 4:16 pm  

Wire On The Telly wrote:

Apart from when the team gets relegated.

This rule didn't help the bottom club avoid relegation because all the decent players in the team were tapped up by other clubs (Knowing they would be contract free) and totally lost interest half way through the season.

Surely the null and void contracts rule was to keep the best players in SL and not just for the financial benefit of the relegated club.

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 5:57 pm  

theredshed wrote:

Basically I think Salford are burdened this year with too many NL1 standard players.
When we were relegated in 2007 all contracts were null and void so the club had to sign up players again for NL1 who would not take one year deals. Castleford had the same kind of problem last year but now appear much stronger since they got shut of the dead wood and recruited new players.

Perhaps it would have been a better idea if the RFL had made all contracts null and void for players of clubs that won a franchise from NL1. It just seems to work one way in the players favour and not the clubs for me?

IMO there are far better quality reserve squad players at other clubs than Salford have in their first team this year.

That'd work

Please come and sign for us and help us get into SL so we can dump you and bring some aussies over

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 5:58 pm  

theredshed wrote:

This rule didn't help the bottom club avoid relegation because all the decent players in the team were tapped up by other clubs (Knowing they would be contract free) and totally lost interest half way through the season.

Surely the null and void contracts rule was to keep the best players in SL and not just for the financial benefit of the relegated club.

there is no null and void rule, many clubs added these to contracts to prevent themselves paying SL level contracts in a league where you don't get £1mil from sky

: Mon Mar 30, 2009 6:08 pm  

Most NL players are on one year contracts anyway, only the 'star' players get anything above a year.

The coach/management team from the time they got relegated and then promoted would have had amply opportunity to weed out any players they didn't want to keep. They also had longer than previously promoted teams as they didn't have to wait to win the Grand final to sort out their team for this season.