ninearches wrote:
Didn't we have a clear out in the Anderson/Plange era that resulted in quite a few duds ,some on long contracts, donning the P&B ?
It wasn't so much a deliberate clear out, more that DVDV had arranged it so players came out of contract at the same time he did. This was meant to allow a new coach chance to appraise the team and take forward the players he wanted to keep and move on the ones he didn't. But we messed everything up with the coach hiring, with DVDV getting disillusioned and leaving mid season, us appointing Neil Kelly then him turning us down, and scrambling around to bring in Anderson/Plange.
Which meant that players who would have been worth keeping signed elsewhere, like Toa, Nutley and Hunte, plus Gee and Langer went back to Brisbane and Nikau retired. Sibbit signed for Melbourne Storm.
Anderson and Plange had to assemble virtually a new squad after the time when most of the free agents had been snapped up, so we were basically in the same position of teams that get promoted and have to start building a SL squad from the scraps left over by the other clubs. We got ourselves saddled with players who were Championship standard and it took Cullen 2 further seasons really to get them out of the club in time for moving to the Halliwell Jones.
Although bad as that Anderson & Plange squad was, I'd prefer their pack to what we have now and I'd love to have Fozzard, Hilton, Paul Wood and even Dale Laughton (past his best but a big unit still) in our front row today, plus guys like Guisset, Burns and Domic in the back row.
