NickyKiss:
Those Saints youngsters coming through are why I would never revel in a club like Saints or Leeds (temporary) demise (and some opposition fans wouldn't do with us). Things can get a bit iffy for a spell and that spell could last a couple of years or even a decade or more but they'll get back to the top eventually, competing for trophies because of that work they do in bringing good players through the systems. I feel like I'm putting the boot in to HKR a bit this last couple of weeks but I'm really not in saying this and that is if they do not start to bring players through, this successful period will be short lived and they'll collapse like a deck of cards eventually. Without a steady stream of academy players coming through, you're a couple of exits and poor signings away from a real drop off.
No I don’t think you are being harsh. I agree. Wigan, Saints and Leeds are the shining lights with youth development and to a lesser extent now so too Warrington who are making great strides.
I still also attribute a lot of their success to Peters. Not so sure other coaches get as much out of that squad which on paper isn’t fantastic. However he’s done a superb job in developing players like Hadley, Batchelor, Broadbent etc and then of course natural stars like Lewis plus some good recruitment.
However there comes a point where their lack of youth coming through hits them. Wigan are now dealing with what we’ve had to deal with winning trophies hitting the SC and players wanting the bigger bucks. Coote and Fages were examples of two that we had to let go. Luckily we had Welsby and Dodd coming through at the time.
Radlinski has now admitted the SC is hurting them too.
French is out for 8 weeks and then Farrimond comes in- a generational talent who probably gets in every other team.
Without that conveyor belt of youth everything becomes much harder.
