Nothing truer may ever have been uttered than your opening sentence.
With regards Cooper Clarke (who I'm sure you've never seen play).
I rated him when he played at St Greg's & was in Wests Matts Cup team. Another poster here didn't.
He stated he thought his improvement came when playing in the Qld Cup. Yet you are missing the point. Melbourne identified him when he was with us and signed him. He was in Qld playing through their pathways. All young players need to be developed & molded to get to NRL level, but talent identification is about finding potential. Back in 2024, the Storm (like B2TL) saw plenty of potential in young Cooper.
As for arguing for the sake of it - you were the one who jumped into this debate. I've simply answered you from there. Why did you jump in on a debate about a young player you've never seen play ????
I think we both know why ...
??? Do you understand what effectively and definitively mean ? I don’t think that’s the big flex you think it is …. As for whether I’ve seen him play . What are you talking about ? wtf would you know what I have or haven’t done … what a stupid comment . Geez you like to gatekeep youth footy over the years .
I jumped in because I thought it was unfair how hard you went about this .. and are still going now . It seems unreasonable .
As for the storm , thy recruit 95% of thier youth system teams. As they finally get some traction in the schools they have down there , a getting local kids through , it’s obviously going less and less .
But for every cooper Clarke they recruit , there’s 10 others they’ve plucked from other clubs who don’t ever succeed . Because much like the roosters , they have zero juniors . So to that point , 99/100 times they debut a kid , there’s a story about how some other club let them go … because of course that happens as where do these players come from if not other clubs.
Thats not to say they don’t have amazing talent identification and amazing scouts , but like I said already , if the wests tigers got it wrong , so did a whole bunch of other Sydney clubs .
Not to mention if the Melbourne storm come knocking , and you’re a parent , your ears are wide open .
And finally because this is the last thing I’ll say on this , I’ve been very critical of the wests tigers junior development systems , particularly wests magpies for a long time . Like when the Lebanese background coach a few years ago , would only pick kids from a certain background at Balmain .
I think they’re trying to fix it now , but there’s coaching issues , retention issues and nepotism issues riddled through our junior systems .
Which I’ve been very vocal on over the past . In fact last week , we were on opposite sides , where you defended the club and I was saying there was issues .
And where do I draw these conclusions . I’ve stated many times , when I was a kid coming through from the south west , they were there, in fact most kids I came up through , who didn’t make the eels , were going all over Sydney , rather than play at wests . It had a bad reputation . Fair or unfair .
Now I see history repeating over and over , watching talented players leave who should have been prioritised instead of others who , we should have evaluated had attitude problems eg. Galvin, and the large family (we should have kept them for clarity) , it’s hard to think much has changed in the past 25 years . So if you’re issue is we suck at evaluating talent , an underlying key personality traits that lead to success. I 💯 agree with you . The storm have the personality test down to a fine art form .
All I said was I don’t think for the 400th time , that a kid who showed promise , but was evaluated much lower by the club , succeeding at another who took a punt on him , necessarily means there was a failure by the wests tigers . It simply means the storm took a punt , and he rose to the occasion . They both should be praised .
Just like we should be when we plucked Jahreem Bula from the Sydney kings .
Or souths giving Cody Walker a chance at 28 I mean I could go on forever.
Or our next superstar Jared Heyward . Came to Balmain as a half , they identified him as a 9, he ends up being an Aus schoolboy once he makes the change , and looking like he’s going to be a very very good nrl player . It happens .
But to your point we have historically had far more misses than wins . And I agree with you. I’m just curious who you put that down to … wests tigers or wests magpies JrLFC. Because for me it’s all of the above . As I’ve stated many times .
