DaveO wrote:
Hamlin is on a two year deal so may leave after next season to return to Oz. I think if he is any good he will be off back home. Sutton is supposed to have left so I can see some sense in recruiting another prop.
At 25 this lad has the advantage of being more physically mature than any of your young players coming out of the academy. With the lack of a reserve grade unless you get some sort of freak it's hard to see how a young prop can be gradually progressed into the first team more so than a back. If this signing is true Barrow have basically been acting as Wigan reserves to produce a prop who at 25 ought to be physically ready to give it a shot in SL.
That said I don't think the club does itself any favours labelling players as "projects". He's 25 so he can't play in the academy set up so he is simply a new signing. It's as if the club is afraid of the reaction if we announce a new signing from Barrow so are excusing it by saying he is a project player.
I'd be more bothered if he was another 19 year old not 25 year old but for him at 25 the only way he is going to play is if he can break into the first team so he's not a project at all in my eyes.
Perhaps the question should not be "Project Players Yay or Nay" but "When are we going to sign a top player"? Apart from Hardaker who is only (potentially) available because of his past issues anyway I can't remember the last top player we were linked to despite senior players supposedly leaving.
Finding it hard to disagree with anything you’ve said there Dave. As for your last question could you have classed FPN as a big name? I’m leaving ever so slightly towards yes, despite his questionable performances. Prior to that Brett Finch/Ryan Hoffman I’d say.
It’s not really IL/SW’s policy to bring in big name recruits, it’s more their style to bring in developing players from either the academy or elsewhere, though not its biggest fan it is financially cost effective and we certainly can’t say it hasn’t produced success; whether we like the style of play or not.
I said this on another post but years ago we were clamouring for more British talent coming through the ranks and less Aussies. Now it has happened we’re now almost clamouring for the opposite, we can’t have it all ways. Perhaps we’ve swung the pendulum too far to British talent and need to find the balance, but thinking about in from an England RL perspective; coming within 6points of a World Cup, again can we really argue it isn’t working?
