LeytherRob

It's ridiculous we have people doing this as a full time job that can't even get players names right on a regular basis. I remember in 2018 when Leigh signed Peter Mata'utia, in the televised games they were calling him Matta Oo-tia.

They are dud signings at the moment, they wouldn't be off to Dewsbury whilst the coach moans about not having enough players otherwise.

Dixon was taken on trial when he was looking for a club and was taken on to provide a bit of depth at a time when we were still building the squad. I would highly doubt he's on any sort of significant wages.

Have Ben Mathiou or Bailey Gill actually played for Fev yet? Some of the strangest import signings i've seen in recent years. Considering McDermott has been in the press saying any more injuries might result in not being able to name a 17, they must be real dud signings..

I find Sheffields announcements similarly tedious, surely by now they could just pin a tweet saying Cory Aston has signed to save the yearly press release?

Macdonald and Asiata are definitely signed up for next year, been suggested Amone, Smith and Aekins are also.

Not a new signing, but a massive deal for Leigh regardless

If we truly want a competitive France squad, then these are the kind of signings that need to happen and be a success. The more French players at top clubs, experiencing different systems the better.

To be honest, i think that's been very much the game plan all season from Lam, it's just that some teams have taken longer to breakdown than others. The philosophy has been defence and big carries down the middle, with more offloads and off the cuff play as the opposition tires. A big factor in our loss in round 2 for me was that our pack didn't have the conditioning in them(or the additional recruits) to have the same impact. In round 2 Sidlow was injured the week prior and didn't play, Chris Green broke his arm in the first set and Amone/Asiata both only arrived very late into preseason so were unfit and facing extended stints.

I'd agree on those 3, although as an outsider looking in it's baffling to see Kheirallah limping through the past 4/5 games with Pickersgill being sent out on loan(and went off injured at Bradford). Seems like the squad management could be a lot better from McDermott who seems to be just going for his preferred players regardless of any knocks or niggles they are carrying. Could be a big risk come the business end of the season.

At one point last night Fev had Jacks, Smith, Ford, Wildie, Jones and Keirallah on at the same time with only one front rower(Esseh). It felt a lot like watching Leigh last year when we were resorting to playing Nathan Peats at prop forward and much like Leigh in 21, the fev squad as a whole looks really unbalanced without a cohesive recruitment plan other than 'sign whoever is available'.

It was confirmed in the Ferguson press release that he was committing to funding a SL team regardless, which to be honest is the only way we're going to stay up. It does make a refreshing change that we are sorting recruitment early for a change, rather than panic buying in October.

I think everyone is well aware of what he is capable of, but i think there were always going to be questions about what kind of player turned out for Leigh today in terms of attitude, discipline and fitness considering his time out the game. Thankfully, he looked top notch on all accounts and was comfortably the best debutant I've ever seen pull on a Leigh shirt. Very much looking forward to seeing how we measure up against Fev next week.

Brand would've had the hattrick(although Ferguson actually got 4), but it wasn't just the tries that were impressive from Ferguson. At times he was just playing a different game to anyone else on the field. The skill to take the high ball under pressure on his own line, squeeze through the tackle and release Chamberlain for his length of the field try was just pure class and there were several other moments like it.

Heart is hoping Toulouse can sneak this one and reignite the relegation battle, head says Wakefield scoring 2/3 late tries to make a close game look one sided in their favour.

Didn't he get 10 games for biting at Toronto?

Not really, the u20's competition didn't run in 2016 and was replaced by a multi-divisional reserves structure. From what I recall, only around 8/9 teams ended up entering this and several dropped out during the course of the season. Yes you can say Leigh could have joined this new reserve structure, but since it was ran pretty farcically and ended up pretty quickly disbanding DB probably made the right decision.

Leigh had an under 20's team in 2013, 2014 and 2015, it was scrapped for the 2016 season because 1. Most other championship teams had already scrapped theirs and 2. Championship teams weren't allowed to run an under 19's which was the proper academy sturcture in SL. The club tried to turn the under 20's into a reserves team to ty and save it but meaningful fixtures became harder and harder to come by. It certainly wasn't through lack of trying. Leighs last under 20's squad contained the likes of Joe Bullock(Wire), Chris Hankinson(Toulouse), Ben Reynolds(Leigh), Frankie Halton(Hull KR), Mitch Cox(Swinton), Jack Hansen(Swinton) and more. https://www.leighjournal.co.uk/sport/10310635.comfortable-for-centurions/ https://daveparkinson.tumblr.com/post/45370640089/leigh-under-20s-continue-unbeaten-start-to-league

That sure looks like a commitment for me...

Most likely scenario is he's looking for an NRL deal in 2023 regardless of the division Leigh find themselves, which i'm comfortable with, providing he puts in the effort this season.

Stockpiling? Leigh have only just hit 25 players for the squad, we're still finishing our off season recruitment!

He was signed for Toronto's SL season, rather than championship

A fact is a verifiable thing, you've just taken one sentence of the release and applied your own narrative to it. You or I have no idea what BF is being paid and how much sponsorship is covering, or even how much money DB had that can cover it. Only in RL can we spin a club getting a new sponsor into a negative...

What loopholes? The only thing Leigh have to be concerned about will be the salary cap, which they will still be well under. There aren't any limits on how big sponsorship can be as far as i'm aware, it would be pretty counter intuitive for a sport struggling for income.