Juniors - Pathways General Discussion

[balmain boy]

Not really still Kids still travelling to other clubs today.

They travel from poorer working class areas to nicer areas. It's just nature, people want to move u up in the world. Which for many involves getting out of Campbelltown

 

[Lestronge]

He was a schoolboy on the gold coast, signed with the dogs lasted a few months then returned home after broken promises.

He'll be in the inner west, or bunking with another junior in a sharehouse or family

Juniors do not train at the coe, it's for NRL players only.

There's why they're building a coe for juniors in Campbelltown with the Uni

In 2025 so 1 year ago , he was voted best player in his age group . The kid is a gun.

 

[Bellend]

They travel from poorer working class areas to nicer areas. It's just nature, people want to move u up in the world. Which for many involves getting out of Campbelltown

Not really plenty of people move around for that opportunity not just Campbelltown

 

[Betterdays22]

That would be one of the stupidest ideas ever. Junior reps are local level. Wests should be able field a strong team on their own. Balmain kids will leave the system and go to Parra or the dogs before they travel to Campbelltown after school for training

It was more in response to the rumour of there being essentially an A and B team. May as well field one team.

Regardless, shouldn't the point be to field strong junior rep teams that produce NRL level talent?

I don't claim to be an expert but how many times has Balmain made the finals in Ball or Matts in the last 5 years? How many NRL players or potential NRL players have been produced? Magpies also wildy underperform for their catchment. Something needs to change.

 

[BinChicken]

Good to get your Balmain pathways intel as always BC. Any word whether we have Aroyan & Kerr also on multi-year pathways deals? Hope so.

Yeah on looking back at the CUBS 16s squad that recently played the Titans, I see it was predominantly the same players against St Helens plus a few others like the Finau brothers & Vaotangi (jeez he looks like his brother).

Makes me wonder how old Zeph & Kingston Finau are if they were in this team as all their team mates it seems are 16 this year but they are both in their 2nd season of Matts so I thought they were turning 17 this year.

Maafu has 100% signed with the club. Not sure about Kerr or Aroyan.

 

[BinChicken]

What are peoples thoughts about the club putting all the best players in the Magpies Matts and Balls teams and the remaining players in the Balmain teams? Essentially habing an A and B team.

For me, i see it as plain stupid. If they are going to do that, then just have one team. Why enter "B" teams only to get flogged every week.

That being said, maybe this move will help with the stupid myth some have that this is a Balmain oriented merger, although im sure they would still complain

From what I understand it’s less about stacking Western Suburbs and more about spreading the talent across both pathways. We’ve already seen that this year with Noah Vaotangi playing for Balmain and Harry Bickhoff going the other way. I don’t believe we’ll see an A and B team