Wests Tigers have cranked up their recruitment drive by meeting Canberra giant Joey Leilua on Monday and completing the finer details on a contract they will offer Adam Doueihi in the next 48 hours.
Leilua met with club boss Justin Pascoe and coach Michael Maguire about swapping Canberra for Concord, despite having a year to run on his deal at the Green Machine.
Joey Leilua could be joining his younger brother Luciano at Wests Tigers this year.The Tigers signed Joey’s younger brother Luciano for this season and are desperate to beef up their stocks in the outside backs.
Leilua, who stands to earn about $700,000 this season in his final year at Canberra, was already told he would not be offered a deal in 2021, and could do it tough to nail down his starting right-centre spot now Curtis Scott had arrived from Melbourne.
While the Tigers are yet to offer Leilua a deal, their pursuit of Doueihi is expected to get more serious in the coming days.
The Tigers have about $800,000 in their cap and can easily accommodate both this year.
South Sydney coach Wayne Bennett informed Doueihi last week he was free to pursue a starting fullback spot elsewhere, especially with Latrell Mitchell to be given first crack at No.1.
Doueihi was given his start in the NRL by former Souths coach Maguire and signed with the Rabbitohs at the time because of their lack of depth in the halves. The chance to be Benji Marshall’s long-term five-eighth understudy also has appeal.
Having the 190cm right-footed Doueihi and left-footed halfback Luke Brooks as the playmakers would seriously excite Tigers fans in future years.
Marshall, 35, next month, is held in such high regard at the club that Tigers officials are more than happy to entertain the idea of him playing on again should he feel physically and mentally fresh at the end of the season.
The Tigers have three spots to fill on their roster, and have not given up hope of luring teen prop Stefano Utoikamanu away from Parramatta a year early.
In Doueihi’s case, the big sticking point for any move will continue to be money, especially with the Lebanon international on a back-ended deal and collecting more than $500,000 this season, then over $600,000 next year.
Souths have already told Doueihi they are happy for him to see out the final two years, and they can accommodate him in their cap, but his best hope of playing could be off the bench.
Doueihi, a second cousin of dumped Wallabies coach Michael Cheika, had interest from the Waratahs before he signed his first NRL deal, but a return to the 15-man code was not on his radar.
"Rugby hasn’t been discussed as an option,’’ Doueihi’s agent Sam Ayoub said on Monday night.
Paul Crawley certainly enjoys putting the boot into the Tigers. Cheap shots and commentary when everyone knows the lack of onfield success.
@Lidcombe_Magpie1 said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
So come on down to a training session, we can always use another person to help out with the teams and you will be warmly welcomed
No thanks, as I told you, I have no interest in Rugby Union. League is all I have time for.
@Tiger_2795 said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
Rugby is miles bigger than league on a world scale i’m afraid. The rate the NRL is going at the moment league will be dead well before Rugby
Is that actually borne out in the data though? Global and domestic rugby vs global and domestic league? They are lightyears apart in Australia and I am not sure that the IRB would run to the rescue if Rugby Australia went belly-up.
@Lidcombe_Magpie1 said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
Seriously dude your rant on Rugby is totally uncalled for
Mate there is only 1 rugby code worth talking about and that’s League. Union’s been fighting a losing battle in this country ever since they decided to cling onto their amateur origins by refusing to pay players, provide insurance or assist them whilst they also worked FT jobs.
After many many decades, Union eventually realised that professionalism was the way to go. In many respects, they are decades behind League in innovation, player support and crowd engagement.
And since Rugby League has sprung into existence, Union has intentionally and systematically tried to use its influence and deeper foundation history to suppress League. This runs everything from the gamut of head-hunting League players, to extermination of the game in Vichy France.
You are correct that AFL will do everything it can to grind League out of existence, but fundamentally AFL and League do not compete in the same space - different core states, school systems, player body shapes, international game etc.
League and Union are active competitors and I have no interest in supporting or upholding Union. I am sure that there are very very many genuine, decent and hardworking people playing low-tier union all over the country, and I hold nothing against them, only to politely suggest they consider League as a superior alternative.
But at the other end of the spectrum, Union typically remains an upper-class caste-protecting mechanism, desperately clung to by the gentry. There are indeed regular folks plying their trade, but all the influence and decision making in Union is entrenched in elitism. This is especially true in countries like Scotland, England, France and South Africa.
@coivtny said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
@jirskyr said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
@bbobb said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
What do you mean when you say St. Pats has a high opinion of itself?
I mean that St Pats tries to position itself as one of the fancy schools in the area, but it’s just a regular Christian Bros with average sporting and academic achievements. And everyone likes beating them in any endeavour possible.
Shame they don’t play League anymore; there’s so much energy wasted in schoolboy rugby, that has no long term purpose within the 4th-ranked dying football code. You’ve got all these kids in ISA / CAS / GPS schools, the latter with their faux exclusivity and horrendous school fees, plying away at rugby to then play Shute Shield or maybe jag some pointless Super Rugby spot, until the powers close a franchise down.
Just to add to your story. In the 1960s my older brother went to St Pats but my parents sent to DLS Ashfield because my brother got expelled and they thought his reputation might make things awkward for me. We played league against Pats in the MCC competition. They were a pretty good league school on par with the other MCC heavies Lewisham, Kogarah and Randwick. Pats lefts the MCC and switched to rugby because they decided they wanted to join the GPS schools competition. They didn’t make it because the GPS schools froze them out. Since then they’ve moved between competitions such as ISA but have never really found a home.
Yeah the difference between wanting to be with the “in crowd” and actually being with the in-crowd.
There’s a whole bunch of schools like Waverley that would love to be in the GPS, and the GPS don’t want anything to do with them.
I went to Lewo - used to be a league heavyweight… not any more! Demographic has changed, still strong in association football, but I don’t believe the current Principal cares much for sport.
I don’t know how DLS Ashfield is going to fair in the MCC in the future when you merge with Bethlehem. It was already hard for St Leo’s to find a competitive outlet for their girls.
And to @Tiger5150’s point, yes networking at these schools is a thing, but also, if you are rich you are going to be able to network with rich folks no matter where you went to school. And if you are a complete moron, all the money in the world isn’t going to help you be smart.
15 and 16 year olds don’t even really understand networking in the adult context, and most of the kids at these schools know hard work if it punched them in the face.
What the NRL should do is invest in and organise ranked school competitions, create their own GPS-type competition. You could possibly have promotion and relegation as school fortunes ebb and flow, because frankly no regular-Joe school is going to compete with schools that have a dedicated sports program.
And it’s hard to foster a long-term rivalry against Commonwealth Bank Cup schools, because you don’t meet the same schools on a regular basis.
As a Lewo boy, still hate Marcellin Randwick!
@bbobb said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
What do you mean when you say St. Pats has a high opinion of itself?
I mean that St Pats tries to position itself as one of the fancy schools in the area, but it’s just a regular Christian Bros with average sporting and academic achievements. And everyone likes beating them in any endeavour possible.
Shame they don’t play League anymore; there’s so much energy wasted in schoolboy rugby, that has no long term purpose within the 4th-ranked dying football code. You’ve got all these kids in ISA / CAS / GPS schools, the latter with their faux exclusivity and horrendous school fees, plying away at rugby to then play Shute Shield or maybe jag some pointless Super Rugby spot, until the powers close a franchise down.
@TrueTiger said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
@cktiger said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
@tigerap said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
@wokesmoke said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
@TopTiger said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
Doesn’t Douehi still live around the Concord area with his parents, more likely then to sign with Tigers than Storm as he is very close to his family from all reports.
Strathfield
He went to St Patrick’s College Strathfield, same year as my son…if he does leave Souffs it wont be to the Storm if he has another Sydney based offer
Obviously a union background then, my son went there.
Any idea what position he played?CK,I went to Chevalier College Bowral,we played against St Pats many times,they quite often produced some very talented footballers,I don’t know how many converted to league but they were pretty tough and classy as far as schoolboy rugby went…
Some kids play both League and Union, depending on what day their non-school club footy is on. Some kids are actually Leaguies and just play a bit of Union because of their school.
I believe Doueihi has always been a League player, he didn’t convert, but he did play Rugby Schoolboys
Interesting tidbit - St Pats originally played League. Most of the schools in the area did/do, but you know St Pats has a high opinion of itself for an Inner West school.
@Spud_Murphy said in Signing Suggestions & Rumours:
That’s weird, I was sure that Packer was a Roosters supporter?
You are aware - James Packer now holds Peter Holmes A Court’s stake in the Rabbits? So not only is he no longer an active participant with Roosters, he’s put his money where his mouth is for Souths.
He and his Dad have flipped and flopped between Souths and Roosters all their lives.
Kerry was, by all accounts, originally a Souths man, but got fairly involved in Roosters affairs in his last decades, and became v. friendly with some Roosters hierarchy. Kerry was friends with Phil Gould. James was a Roosters board member at one time and good mate of Uncle Nick.
But James is also a good mate of Rusty Crowe and it seems that over time his old Souths heritage has resurfaced.
So just maybe they were Souths men all along and the business aspect brought them into the Roosters fold for a while.
@Macca0806 said in Wests Tigers Sign Luciano Leilua till 2022:
I spoke to him after the last day of training in Brisbane and he was really upbeat and very positive about his opportunity at the Wests Tigers. He spoke highly of the coaches and the playing group and he was very personable with my family. He struggled a little bit with the training drills but he wasn’t on his own as it was challenging sessions on the 2 days I attended. His attitude and determination was impressive as he never gave up and in light of his health issues makes this even more impressive.
Turns out he had shingles, he spent Christmas in hospital.