The Blues Ox

Is that a question? Did I think Leigh would be signing Sam Burgess? Yes, Yes I did.

Some loonie tune on the Leigh forum reckons they are signing Sam Burgess. Im sure he would love to give up all his commitmants to play for 100k under DB.

Bloody freezing in Cumbria all year round.

No point me posting that, I thought that was already a given.

But can he do it on a cold Sunday afternoon in Cumbria?

Rumor has it that he had heard about the gigs we have been having at the Piece Hall and decided that Halifax were too upper class for him and that he wouldn't fit in.

Ooooh theres an idea, what if it is Leeds that have signed him but he will start the season at Fev. Would it be a surprise to see him DR at Leeds at some point next season? Even if that is the case, and Im not suggesting it is, then it is still good business for Fev adding to what was already the best squad in the Championship.

Rubbish signing, wouldn't even get in the Leigh team.

Also isn't it great that the Championship is looking so good next season that we can talk about it so much and its only November. Roll on the season.....then bring on 2023 after about 5 weeks in.

How though? Your owner still thought he had a golden ticket for SL this coming season. Any decent SL player signed will have more than likely executed their get out options and most good part time players will probably already have been signed up when DB realised that he had been screwed over by SL. Some players that Leigh ended up keeping had not even been offered contracts with 3/4 of the SL season gone. Matty Gee as an example had already signed for Fax before Leigh eventually offered him a contract. You can't blame the players for wanting to sort their futures out and also to be fair its hard to blame Leigh given the hand they were dealt you just wonder could they have been better prepared. Also makes you wonder who has been signing the players. If its Chester then it just shows how late to the party they are.

I think the main advantage that the chasing pack have this season is that they will really only have to cause one close to a major upset to get to SL. Last year not only did they have to go to Fev and win there they also had to then go to France and try and get a win there. This season all I can see is Fev clear top and then about 5 or 6 teams jockeying for the other positions with any of them capable of beating each other.

I can't help but think you are going to be so disappointed a few games in to the season if you think that isn't true.

What is your thinking behind that? If anything Leigh(and Fev to some extent) have had the hardest tasks of putting together a team for this season. Leigh seemed to have this belief that they were still going to be in SL next season but because of that they left recruitment late and with disruptions behind the scenes the player pool available to them has got smaller and smaller. In comparison other teams, using Fax as an example, knew by 1/2 way through the season which league we were going to be in, we had an idea of the standard we have to aim for with Fev and Toulouse showing that, we had money in the bank and basically had first pick of not only the best part time players but also some full time players that were realistically available to us. By the time the season kicks off we will have had about 8 months or so to plan for it, Leigh are probably 3 or 4 months behind. Now Im not wanting people to take that as me saying Fax are going to top the league or even get 2nd but we have given ourselves a fighting chance but Fev should be big favorites in my opinon and then you could throw a blanket over a lot of other teams including Leigh at least until their recruitment is done.

It does, it should be a good year and now Leigh have taken the favs mantle with the lam announcement. Or at least they have in the eyes of the bookies.

This has to make Leigh favs for next year?

I may be out of line here and it might not be the right time or place but in my opinion and probably in the opinion of Danny's family, it should be someone like Tony Tonks who should be getting that MBE.

How dare you? Im usually within 8 places or so of been right for each team every year.

Fev and Toulouse would both have faired better in SL last season than Leigh in my opinion. When Leigh got picked their squad was certainly not top 2 and even after bringing players in I still think Toulouse would have taken care of them. The Toulouse V Fev playoff game was a hard one to judge as Fev looked to have a real off day and I can't imagine prep for the trip to France was easy.

Anyone not thinking Fev are massive favs even with Leigh dropping down are massively out of touch with the Championship in my opinion. Fev are the benchmark that the rest of the teams will be aiming at.

Yeah I dont think there will be many other teams complaining. Im more worried that we will lose both our Bradford and Fev home games later in the season to a Monday night game which would cost the club a fortune I would imagine. Although it would be nice if our last game of the season had some importance riding on it.

Looks like Leigh and Widnes are the Premier darlings to start the season. Might be weird after 10 games when people start questioning why they keep showing mid table teams every week.

Premier expecting Widnes and Leigh to be good entertainment by the looks of it with 4 games each in the first lot of fixtures.

Ah yeah I suppose. I wouldn't want Batley fans thinking that it were Fax fans saying it would be easy, they normally have a big enough chip on their shoulders about us anyway.

Not sure who has said it will be easy apperently, as Fax fans we know our team can make the easiest thing look difficult. It really don't matter what team we put out at Batley, its always a real struggle.

Bloody Batley, its like every year they ruin my mood for the new season.