TRB wrote:I think what you might be witnessing is the spreading out of the best talent. Let's take Westerman for example. There is no doubt that, 10 years ago, JW would have been lined up for a 'big-4' club right now. He hasn't, in fact he has a long-ish term deal at Cas' - and I hope he stays there for a long time. This is just an example of the fact the talent pool is now spread wider amongst the clubs.
However, despite there being MORE decent players being produced, there are fewer clubs with a monopoly of the talent and therefore fewer games of, say, the quality of last weeks Saints-Leeds game. The up side is that there is more and more chance of these clubs being beaten by other clubs in the comp.
Although jonh and others decry the loss of more 'big' games, the truth is that the majority of games 10 years ago were either predictable (big club versus small club) or of poorer quality (I would think of our team circa 2001 for example compared to now). Time dulls the memory and the games that we do tend to remember are mostly the better ones and I would suggest that there is some selective memory going on here for some.
The game is improving - I have no doubt about that at all.
I would suggest that because you have seen an undoubted improvement at Wakefield you see this in the League.
We will have to disagree on this one I think.