LeytherRob

DB gave Chester/Lam the go ahead to recruit for next year based on SL budget regardless of the league we're in back in April and they've been working on recruitment since. Signing announcements don't tend to happen until players play their last game for their current club as we saw for Jake Trueman and others, there will be announcements to come at the conclusion of the season. Was it not for Charnley completely falling out with DP, he'd have likely only been announced come October. Zero chance of James Cunningham signing after he backed out last minute from the 2 player swap deal with Huddersfield last year. Peats and Peteru went one way, Ashworth came the other with Cunningham supposed to join him. Seems Hudds weren't too impressed with his conduct either considering they didn't play him for the rest of the year and showed him the door.

Players like Caleb Aekins, Krisnan Inu, Mark Ioane, Ben Nakubuwai are definitely not irreplaceable. Ata Hingano and Jy Hitchcox have already basically left. The only real holes to fill are Sam Stone(who is rumoured to be off to Melbourne Storm) and Kai O'Donnell(GF is apparently homesick so going back to Oz). This idea that Leigh are gonna be starting from scratch next year is just daft. Edit. Also, to answer the OP. No, Leigh are obviously not going to finish top 6 SL next year. It's just journalistic sensationalism, something SARL deals exclusively in.

Would be the case if we waited til then to start recruiting, but recruitment for SL 23 has been underway since April/May. New players just can't/won't be announced until conclusion of the season

Leigh's points against is less than half of the next lowest team. Think the defence is alright to be honest.

Leigh's points difference is now up to 950, more than any other teams points scored.

Absolutely, i was sure he'd miss one of the last kicks especially the one off the touchline whilst rushing the kick. Also, the reverse no look pass from Edwin Ipape at full tilt to put Ioane in for his second try was world class.

Leigh were absolutely ruthless in the second half today. The way the players were rushing to get back for kick off and attacking from deep on plays 1/2 you'd have though they were 12 down in the mpg.

Well....

I notice York have only named a 17-man squad for tomorrow and missing quite a few key players. Could get ugly if Leigh are in the mood.

In terms of getting our strongest team on the pitch, i'd probably say the first 6/7 games of the 2017 SL season was about as good as it got when we beat St's, Wire and Hudds and should have been Leeds. Then it became a procession of injuries and by mid season we were relying on brining in loan players like Matty Fleming, Curtis Naughton and Nick Rawsthorne. From memory we had 2 mid season injury retirements in Willie Tonga and Dayne Weston along with several big injuries that were the beginning of the end for players such as Gaz Hock(knee), Dan Mortimer(MCL) and Cory Paterson(concussions). As for last year, well aside from the severely understrength side we started the season with, we had 2 mid season concussion retirements in Tyrone McCarthy and Blake Wallace along with injury retirements for Lewis Tierney and Ben Flower. Think we used somewhere in the region of 35 players in 2017 and got to squad number 37 last year.

True lol, to be honest this is the first season since probably 2015 where we've actually played our strongest 13 for more than a handful of games, let alone most of the season.

Very true. Also it tends to get forgotten about in amongst all the outgoings but when the players like Ben Crooks/Craig Hall etc were signed elsewhere on the cusp of the 8's, they were replaced by players of lesser value(Walne brothers, Will Dagger etc) and we went into those 8's with a squad of 23/24 players before getting absolutely ravaged by injuries(and yet another suspension for Jamie Acton being braindead) all hitting within 3/4 games. Both Fev and Leigh had shocking luck with injuries that year.

I assume you're referring to him sharing his highlights on twitter today, that doesn't suggest that he's left immediately, just that he's actively looking for next year now. It would be pointless for any of them to leave right now as no other club could register them meaning they would be out of pocket.

I don't remember seeing this, was it covered by any journalists?

I'd be surprised if the game didn't go ahead, players will want to be putting themselves in the shop window now to try and find deals for next year

All the clauses come from a standard list at the RFL and the only real break clause is on relegation from SL.

Next one is Batley v Dewsbury on Monday 29th, which is a pretty uninspiring choice considering the current state Dewsbury are in.

I think you've misunderstood, Toby is referring to the Falcons/Thunder owner slashing the Falcons playing budget by 20% because they have a 3 year safety net from relegation in the RU premiership i.e. a license.

I think ultimately Newcastle's failure was leaving an very unexperienced and unproven coach to deal with what is a very tricky transition from PT to FT, along with having no depth to the squad whatsoever. They signed some good players and had a decent enough 17 on paper that should have been capable of pushing for 4th/5th but nothing outside of it. I can scarcely recall ever seeing them naming what i'd consider close to their best 17 and it's mostly been kids from Wigan plugging the gaps.

Ultimately, that's always what tends to happen in Licensing and we saw it during our own period at the clubs lower down the table.

They're pretty much in the same position Leigh were in 2018, they'll have to either move players on or negotiate settlement agreements and hope that none of the players dig their heels in. I imagine there will be a few championship coaches/chairmen making a lot of phone calls this morning.

I was more referring to the fact the first post of that thread being about Bradford

Don't worry, normal service has resumed on the 'bring back licensing' thread!

I don't think i've ever seen a Leigh fan claiming we're going to be top 4 when getting promoted, especially not last time we came up in 2020. The general consensus was that it would take a miracle to stay up. As for if/when we get back, anything but 12th will do just nicely for me.