Signings, Suggestions & Rumours Discussion

[Tucker]

If we need a current example of how a team revolves around a player NOT wearing #7, look at Newcastle. Cogger would do just as good a job as Hastings in that team. The player is almost irrelevant. All the attack comes through Ponga.

Look at Melbourne. Munster runs that team from #6.

Illias is an 'organising half', but all the direction comes from Walker & Latrell. Illias has a job- don't mess it up.

Titans- Foran.

Bulldogs- Burton


There are nearly as many clubs run by the #6 as the #7. It's just how you set your systems up.

There is no reason Sullivan can't be a success at 7 while Fainu directs the team's attack.

No you have it wrong.
All those players run the attack.
The team though is run through the organising half.
Without the effort of the guys who do the boring work implementing the coaching plans and strategy, the Munsters and Pongas are far less effective.

 

[Kaito]

I'm so happy will are still talking about Hastings

Guarantee you that he would be pleased 2 haha

 

[Tigers_Wests]

Where is all this Olam chat coming from?

One of the papers reporting that he is out of favour with Storm and that if an offer was made to Storm to release him, they would consider it.

As long as his falling out with Storm has nothing to do with ongoing injuries, I would be on board with getting him over to us. Immediately would become our best centre next year.

 

[diedpretty]

You wait for a player and keep making offers for the right type of player you need

Otherwise what’s the alternative ?

You sign a player for 4 years to play out of position and hope it works when it hasn’t worked for the last 12 years?

You can’t make a number 6 play controlling 7.

It like works for 1.5/ 5 games

Which is not enough to make the finals

And god no. Def not madden.

You bring in Sezer like they’re supposedly doing and then wait for another 7 to pop up.

And we have been doing that - offers to Munster, Moses, Pearce and Johnson all knocked back. All the top halves are now locked up. We can't just sit on our hands and hope that a topline 7 becomes disgruntled where he is and by some miracle wants to play with the WT. Just bringing in Sezer doesn't solve our halves problem as we would still be short of a 6 and backups.

 

[TigerNeddyK]

Someone needs to be sacked if the 2.2 is correct 🤦‍♂️

Huh ? 🤔 why ? Seems like a fair price for a rising NRL half ..

 

[TigerNeddyK]

Steve, I have noticed you get very fixed on "reported" figures. Always take a few hundred thousand off anything the Tele reports IMO.

I'm not sure about the Sullivan deal, but the Fainu boys are on about half what you believe and I imagine the 2.2m quote by Buzz about Jayden is inflated too.

Dragons would be throwing in for the first year for a start.

Same, a lot of the supporters on this forum seem overly fixated on Figures .. I do not get it at all., they also whinge that we cannot sign anyone then whinge and whine about the salary .. absolutely confuses the F out of me .. seems to be a lot of would be accountants that must just be jealous about what NRL players earn.. why worry when we have no control over it, it has no quantifiable effect on our enjoyment of the teams performance and as such it is not our problem .

 

[Roar_Power]

I think WT have done relatively well to secure two rising stars and a seasoned game manager for around the $1.2m mark. Might be less if St George is paying some of Sullivan's freight over the next year or two.

Need to now concentrate solely on positions 3-5.

 

[TigerNeddyK]

The 3 you mention were proven duds on double what Sullivan is reported to be earning. With WT supporters crucifying every young player signing, any wonder why we have trouble attracting players to the club. So with the halves out there, who do you suggest we should have signed and for how much?

The whiners on this forum want Nathan Cleary signed on $200,000 season and as soon as he signs they will start bagging his defence , saying he is injury prone , is unproven in their eyes and has a suspect kicking game and then a few will start saying that they see him as a centre or a second rower .. I’ve read some really odd stuff on this thread over the last month or so and it’s starting to worry me ☹️🥺🧐

 

[Coastie_Tiger]

I think WT have done relatively well to secure two rising stars and a seasoned game manager for around the $1.2m mark. Might be less if St George is paying some of Sullivan's freight over the next year or two.

Need to now concentrate solely on positions 3-5.

Yeah im with you from what we were left with options wise i think its the best possible outcome. I think Brooks and us has had its day. Sullivan and Fainu could be anything and heres hoping they are, Sezer is an sensible signing on a 1+1 deal if thats the way it goes down.
I don't believe we would be tipping in full freight for Sullivan despite what the Pascoe emailer said, look at Fainu it was 2 mil over 4 yrs then it came out it wasnt.
But you're 100% now we need to attack some outside backs also move a few on imo.

 

[TigerNeddyK]

Let’s all call this what it really is

Tartak gave us the Fainus

We owe tartak

We take sullivan for two more years and pay him full freight even though dragons didn’t want him

That’s the truth

Mate, please give it a rest ,, sleep or whatever because your negative and condescending comments are unfair and insulting towards people that have not even played for us yet. At least give them a go before you start posting insulting slanderous smears based on your opinion and zero evidence .. it’s not fair and it’s seriously close to just trolling.. 🤝

 

[Lestronge]

Just find it odd you single out Hastings.

It’s the anti brooks stuff , combined with releasing Hastings meshed into one horrible take /opinion .
I guess for me , I never fell for his pandering to the fans bullshit last year that had a lot of people saying “this is a leader right here” . I feel there’s some residuals from that as well .

 

[TigerNeddyK]

I think we should all temper our expectations. These guys are not established first graders. I'm more excited for next year than this one though because this year is clearly a write off and one of the worst years we've had.

Still I like Fainu and Sullivan. I think they will score some points. The issue will be can they defend.

It gives us some threats though. Our main threat for years has been Brooks and he isn't good enough to shoulder that load. Now we have two threats who are this point are clearly not as good as Brooks but maybe they can develop into better players over time.

Latu is a teriffic defender .. Andrew John’s like defender for a halfback , or even Kimmorly like ,, that front on low hit hard under the ribs halfback.. Sullivan goes ok as well .. Sezer knows his business also .. I really really like these signings , they are young and full of potential and drive to succeed , they could develop a real combination and I think that could be what Benji also is banking on

 

[Lestronge]

I agree with your point on Hastings. I don't get the obsession with him. He has left and to me it's a non-issue. Someone questioned me about why we are talking about him the other day and I stopped. I don't know why the topic keeps coming up. I keep waiting to watch him play a good game and it keeps not happening. Gamble looked to me like much more of a threat than Hastings yesterday. We should be talking about letting him go. Why did we let Gamble go ? He is killing it. Anyone interested ?

I am though interested in your comments about players coming through. Fainu is the most highly rated junior player to come through in years. Bula, Pole, Kit Laulilii, Stef, Matamua, Faagutu, TDS and others all have big wraps and a couple of them are doing well in first grade. Stef was picked for origin this year.

These are the guys that are going to bring us forward. I think we'll see a lot of changes in our squad over the next 5 years or so. The question is can we develop a team that wins some games.

Yep agree with everything . My post before this one answers the constant Hastings talk , I reckon .
Like I’ve said before Sullivan was kid before fainu was the kid . If we were in the nba/ nfl they would be top 3-5 draft picks of their respective years .
And chuck in the other fainu who looked the most likely forward on the field in the origin game , and if we were building a club , say nfl and got that much talent in one offseason , regardless of experience you’d be really really pumped about it .
The 3 kids are good . real good, they just have 35 year old origin halfbacks in front of them .

 

[TigerNeddyK]

Is it a 1 man team?

No mate, but the half plays a big role in how the team plays together

 

[TigerNeddyK]

If we don’t score more than 2 tries today it will again prove we have more attacking deficiencies than just the halves, so let’s wait and see.

I fail to see the logic,, How does it prove that ? To me it enforces the fact that the halves are a massive problem not minimise it .

 

[TigerNeddyK]

He fires out of the line and more often or not it comes off. However he doesn’t leave himself many alternative options. In Melbourne it works. In our side he will be well exposed.

Like Nofa is and Kepoa and now Toa ?? But at least when Olam does it he actually takes the player out of the play .👍🏼😉

 

[Dennisspicer1]

Is it a 1 man team?

Pretty much ponga.

 

[TigerNeddyK]

Anyone with half a brain knows the one player who’s carrying that team. It ain’t the 7

And the people with an entire brain know he is doing a very good job as the 7

 

[bptiger 0]

I think WT have done relatively well to secure two rising stars and a seasoned game manager for around the $1.2m mark. Might be less if St George is paying some of Sullivan's freight over the next year or two.

Need to now concentrate solely on positions 3-5.

I would like to know who the seasoned game manager is 🤔

 

[Telltails]

Same, a lot of the supporters on this forum seem overly fixated on Figures .. I do not get it at all., they also whinge that we cannot sign anyone then whinge and whine about the salary .. absolutely confuses the F out of me .. seems to be a lot of would be accountants that must just be jealous about what NRL players earn.. why worry when we have no control over it, it has no quantifiable effect on our enjoyment of the teams performance and as such it is not our problem .

Probably because it took has two to three years to address the cap issues that Cleary created through signing players on long inflated contracts that did not produce results.