: Fri Feb 27, 2009 9:48 am
I was just thinking that - we signed Fozzard and Hilton in 2002 when both of them had suffered multiple broken arms in the preceding seasons.
Sometimes it is a gamble which comes off, you can get your hands on a quality player who other clubs are overlooking because of being worried about injuries. When Blackburn signed Roque Santa Cruz he had a history of injuries at Bayern Munich but thats rarely mentioned now he's a striker lots of clubs want.
I know Andy Coley's star has waned a bit in the last couple of years but there was a while when he was one of the best forwards in the league and given that he's a Warrington lad everyone was saying why did Wire miss out on him. I read an interview with Coley where he said Warrington were looking at him during Van de Velde's time but we thought he was too much of a risk because he'd had a knee reconstruction so young. If we'd have signed him and he'd got injured everyone would have said we should have seen that coming...
I think it comes down to making an educated risk now and again, it does seem like Warrington have signed lots of players with a track record of injury so we have to take the rough with the smooth if we do find some of them go down again.