We need a recruitment 'win'...

[Telltails]

Without rehashing over again past mistakes - stability and good financial management are new to this club it will take a little time for players and managers to get their heads around that. In the meantime we are quietly suring up young talent that other clubs can't afford to keep and retaining the players who we want to lead them.

If we can't land a marquee, then I agree with that approach.

But I think that approach also needs a clear "look, this is a long term project...it will take time" message, rather than "finals or failure" type rhetoric.

Agree

 

[earl]

Thanks for the correction, and yes, that is right. It was the chair.
With this squad, IF we add no rep level players…honestly, you would expect a finals spot?
We failed last year and have lost our best forward by a mile, pus Robbie, Esan and Liddle.
And gained no one who will contribute much.
Not trying to sound negative, but the squad as it stands today will struggle to be competitive most weeks. Madge did a masterful job getting them to 9th last year. Being competitive with this current squad in 2020 would be a bloody good effort.
Add in LM, Lomax and a gun forward and, yes, finals min.
But, as it stands today, competitive each week would be a hell of a job.

I think we need a marquee player as well if we want to do well next year. I think we need more than just a marquee player though. We need a couple of players. If we get LM, LL and Lomax I think we will be a significantly better team.

It's not that bad though. There is plenty of time until the season starts plus players get moved on all the time. If you have money you can pick those players up.

 

[earl]

@ElleryHanley I thought there were rules in place for severely back loaded contracts. Because of what Hasler did to the Dogs and Manly. Also the reason that went pear shaped was Packer was supposed to go west , and the riff backed out at the 11th hour .

Severely, yes.

But not for general upgrades.

It is worth noting that DWZ was recently "extended" by the Dogs, which literally means they upgraded him with their extra cap space next season.

I don't want to make this a DWZ thread as he was no loss imo. However, it 'did' say something that he would rather have joined the last placed team and Dean Pay than us.

It says money matters.

 

[jirskyr]

This thread is silly.

We don't need any "win". Madge can still build a good team the old-fashioned way, with smart buys, juniors and upskilling the blokes we have.

Not against signing big-name players but it's not the be-all of NRL.

Also, being linked with players is meaningless. You don't know how hard Tigers chased any of the named players, and arguably the list of "players Tigers looked at" is far far larger, because Tigers would be doing their due diligence on any potential player movement in the market. That's the silly part, to be concerned about being linked with Moyland or Tetevano or something as unlikely, left-field and totally speculative as Milford.

It is not "silly" mate...the new CEO has come out and said anything short of the top 8 next season is a massive fail.

Building through kids takes years...and we have tried that multiple times, with most leaving us once they reached their peaks.

If we are going to make the finals, we need to land a couple of big names / strike weapons.

I'd be interested in how you think the current squad without a big signing is going to possibly make the finals next season?

We were 1 win from the finals last year. So to actually make the finals we only need a small relative improvement.

All the other stuff about being linked to players I don't care. That's what happens when you have salary cap space. I don't agree that you need to jag one big name player to be good enough go play finals. I mean your list - Lomax, Tetevano, Brimson, Luciano are hardly "big fish".

 

[WeHaveCheeKam]

Ivan does not have more appeal than Maguire. Currently, Ivan has a far superior roster and players want to play with good players. The fact is, we are heavily hurt by the fact that big players have asked to leave our club. Tedesco, Woods, Moses, Matterson etc. It is very rare you get players of this nature, some in their prime, choosing to leave their club, and it would put doubt in any players mind, to the point where we all know that even bigger money signings we brought in like Reynolds, only came because we overpaid them, and not because Ivan had so much pulling power.

Players are worried about their career going nowhere at the Tigers, not playing finals, not playing with good quality players (look at the different in Tedesco at Roosters vs Tedesco at us) which limits their opportunity. I know people think our future is bright, but if I line out best 13 or 17 up against any other team, I do struggle to figure out which club we have a better roster than.

 

[05wt05]

@ElleryHanley
I think we have had a number of recruitment wins, we have recruited beautifully in terms of our younger and up and coming players, irrespective of Mitchell, the future looks bright and after seeing as how every player improved in leaps and bounds under Maguire im really comfortable and confident in our future. The way i think about it is like this, if we found one Tedesco why cant we find another great fullback in time, we've already found one. We just need a bit of patience, im as frustrated as anyone im sick of seeing the bottom half of the ladder, though its better for the club to proceed with caution with our cap than get into trouble again with a bad contract just for the sake of signing someone out of desperation.

 

[TigerWest]

@ElleryHanley
I think we have had a number of recruitment wins, we have recruited beautifully in terms of our younger and up and coming players, irrespective of Mitchell, the future looks bright and after seeing as how every player improved in leaps and bounds under Maguire im really comfortable and confident in our future. The way i think about it is like this, if we found one Tedesco why cant we find another great fullback in time, we've already found one. We just need a bit of patience, im as frustrated as anyone im sick of seeing the bottom half of the ladder, though its better for the club to proceed with caution with our cap than get into trouble again with a bad contract just for the sake of signing someone out of desperation.

IMO, LM has the ability to get us into the top 8, if he was with us last year, we would have been comfortably top 4 or 5. (I do blame Madge for this as he took forever to try another goal kicker) But once we are in there, then players will come.
Development has not delivered and the premier clubs like Easts & Storm will pick up the players who show promise anyway, unless we are a successful club (currently we are not).
The only measurement in any sport is result's and we have failed for years, we finally have some cash, we need to buy the best we can, now, not wait for another Teddy, who may never come.

 

[Mighty_Tiger]

Statement of expectations.

Our new chair doesn’t help the situation by making the top 8 comment before we signed anyone and after we lost both of our top 9’s, our best forward and Masters. Let alone advocate we have ALOT OF MONEY - which helps no one in trying limit offers made.

Its easy to make a statement but without a team that can achieve that then our chair is bonkers making that statement so early on.

 

[supercoach]

I think this year we've had the best recruitment of juniors out of any club in the NRL.

And these kids are firstly no specials to make the grade, and secondly three years off being NRL week in and out First graders and than ripe for the picking by the predator clubs.

Don’t get me wrong you have to build from the bottom up with quality juniors but you also have to build from the top down with real quality NRL players to get the right mix

 

[Spud_Murphy]

This thread is silly.

We don't need any "win". Madge can still build a good team the old-fashioned way, with smart buys, juniors and upskilling the blokes we have.

Not against signing big-name players but it's not the be-all of NRL.

Also, being linked with players is meaningless. You don't know how hard Tigers chased any of the named players, and arguably the list of "players Tigers looked at" is far far larger, because Tigers would be doing their due diligence on any potential player movement in the market. That's the silly part, to be concerned about being linked with Moyland or Tetevano or something as unlikely, left-field and totally speculative as Milford.

It is not "silly" mate...the new CEO has come out and said anything short of the top 8 next season is a massive fail.

Building through kids takes years...and we have tried that multiple times, with most leaving us once they reached their peaks.

If we are going to make the finals, we need to land a couple of big names / strike weapons.

I'd be interested in how you think the current squad without a big signing is going to possibly make the finals next season?

We were 1 win from the finals last year. So to actually make the finals we only need a small relative improvement.

All the other stuff about being linked to players I don't care. That's what happens when you have salary cap space. I don't agree that you need to jag one big name player to be good enough go play finals. I mean your list - Lomax, Tetevano, Brimson, Luciano are hardly "big fish".

So you don’t think that losing Matterson, Farah and to a lesser extent Marsters, and not signing anyone of note, will weaken us?

 

[supercoach]

@Spud_Murphy ..spud without doubt we are weaker than last year and by some distance. Of course still a few irons in the fire so that could change in a flash but at present you don’t need to be Einstein to know with no quality no1 and no quality no 9 and two quality forwards short of NRL quality pack, your going need all the luck in the world to be competitive...and than some.

 

[Telltails]

Hooker is a big problem. Such a critical position in the modern game - and we have been down the makeshift path before.

 

[Russell]

@Russell How has he jumped the gun so far our only offical signing is Walters maybe we are waiting for any good ones to go then make our run .But we can wait till 30th June

Well, he's jumped the gun because out of all the players that were named only 2 have been signed - all the others are still available.

Who's to say we won't do any good with the rest of them, assuming we would want them anyway.

The worst thing we can do is go out and sign some "Plodders" and waste the money we do have. It would satisfy a few impatient Forumers but that is about all, apart from pull us back into the mire.

Who we buy for 2021 is the most important thing we will have done for 10 years.

That will be our destiny going forward imo.

 

[Russell]

@ElleryHanley I thought there were rules in place for severely back loaded contracts. Because of what Hasler did to the Dogs and Manly. Also the reason that went pear shaped was Packer was supposed to go west , and the riff backed out at the 11th hour .

Severely, yes.

But not for general upgrades.

It is worth noting that DWZ was recently "extended" by the Dogs, which literally means they upgraded him with their extra cap space next season.

I don't want to make this a DWZ thread as he was no loss imo. However, it 'did' say something that he would rather have joined the last placed team and Dean Pay than us.

Maybe he didn't want to sign a back ended contract - have you thought about that.

 

[Furious1]

Sick of hearing how Madge missed Dallin. The money wasn't there and Gus Gould steered him in the direction of the Dogs. Its really that simple. Time to put it to bed.

 

[SeanT]

@Furious1 spot

I honestly dont mind that we havnt got a big name yet. By all reports we are paying the right amount of money to players now instead of when Cleary paid 33% overs last time.

Im not interested in Latrell anymore honesty. Rather habe a crack at Drimkwater and then go after Jai arrow. If not im happy to nide our time.

 

[Jimmy]

@SeanT not sure why everyone wants arrow? hed be on 800k next contract..and for what? imo he is a work horse like a twal, I don't see him bending the line with his impact, so why would we want an arrow when we have a twal, what we need is a high impact prop that brings fear into the enemy, and some speedy backs with height I might add

 

[Goanna57]

@Russell Mate agree 100% about the future signings but we need to get players to the club for the right reasons not just dollars we can’t just hogtie players to the club.IF we are making offers to good players and getting turned down we need to address why no more plodders please

 

[jirskyr]

So you don’t think that losing Matterson, Farah and to a lesser extent Marsters, and not signing anyone of note, will weaken us?

Not hugely, no. Matterson yes, the others can be covered.

But it's not that simple. The idea that "playing group 2019" minus "Player X" = worse side doesn't hold true. Tommy Talau might really kick on and there are a large number of other budding juniors that might come good earlier than we thought, or towards back end of the year.

Or players like Momirovski and Brooks will continue to develop, we might get Mbye back to peak fitness, Aloiai not injured etc.

 

[gallagher]

Hooker is a big problem. Such a critical position in the modern game - and we have been down the makeshift path before.

For about 4 off seasons, just stop gaps used for the most important position.