As you were.

Agree with Seth's comments on v3.0. We were looking mighty skinny with respect to actual props before Holroyd got injured, and it was only a matter of time before one of them became unavailable. In a completely normal season prop you'd expect to have one prop unavailable at any point in time through injury.

What worries me is how light our bench might be. Most of the time Agar maxes out with two props on the bench even when everyone's fit and often just one (nearly all games in 2020), so I'm not sure he'll be as worried as others. I just think its not a very good idea - most NRL sides generally have one light utility forward and three boppers on the bench for a reason, albeit often with a Thompson-esque prop/second row in the mix. Your bench hooker then covers the halves and you just muddle through with a second row elsewhere in the backs if one of the others gets injured.

As far as I'm aware only Agar has this obsession with 'middles'. The knock on effect is not having enough genuine props and having too many second rows in the squad. We've got Bentley, Gannon, Martin, Mellor, Donaldson and Walters fighting over two starting positions which means its likely two of them will be on the bench at any time and at least one of them will be expected to fill in as a prop at some stage.

We offered King a new deal which he turned down.Konnie was offered a deal which he turned down.Both these were confirmed Agar. Martin signed his deal after both the above deals were turned down.We couldn't sign all three due to quota regulations.I never saw the logic in resigning Martin when we were already short of props but had plenty of second row options. I can only think there just wasnt the right prop out there to sign so Martin was offered a one year deal.

Mustapha is a different player to King but for me could play a valuable role. Whilst not as powerful as King or as big, he has a better engine and a bit of pace when needed too. I thought he went really well for KR at the end of last season.

If we keep Thompson, Prior and Tet up front we're kind of OK for now, but I always worry they overplay Mik. Get a couple more injuries and that group and we're stuffed for go-forward in centre field.

Maybe one of the academy props is ready to do the odd 20 min stint for first grade this year.

Dont think theres any ready to be Honest jim, in the sense that they're actually knocking on the door because they're that good, playing them because theres nobody else is a different matter and may possibly happen at some point.

Joe Hird is a good player and seems to understand whats needed from a teams props, but think he needs some physical development before he's first team ready.

I know we havnt even started this one, but Really hope we replace Bodene with a big, natural NRL prop and re-sign Tyler Dupree for next season.

Bad news about Holroyd injury. He seems to be a touch injury prone to me. Bit like JJB used to be early in his career.

Holroyd Injury is unfortunate for him & team he had a horror pre season last year with Injury we are light at prop now definitely don't think we'll bring anyone in and rightly so if the quality isn't there to get at the moment. For round 1 hoping no more injuries I'd have a pack of

8.Oledzki
9. Leeming
10. Prior
11. Bentley
12. Martin
13. Smith

Subs
14. Dwyer
15. Mellor
16. Tetevano
17. Thompson

As ever the guru on youth development mate. I was honestly a bit surprised we let Tyler go in the first place, although of course we can't keep them all. Think there's a chance he could end up back at Leeds then?

He would probably be a great for what we need as cover right now...

Totally agree on the big, natural NRL-type prop. To be fair, signing one is easier said than done and I'm resigned to us not being able to sort this out properly until we have significant cap and quota available next season. We are going to have to make calls on players like Briscoe to make it happen though (of course he might play his way to another contract this year yet).

You would think we have targets in mind already.

I was dissapointed when we let him go, but looking back, it was the best move for him. He's worked hard and got himself in much better condition, he's got regular game time, won championship young player of the year and earned himself a move to widnes...He really couldnt of done any more with the move.

He's on a 1 year deal at widnes, if he maintains his current trajectory, he'l be hot property for next season. He's a better player than Scurr at Bradford imo, and has a much higher ceiling than the likes of Matty English, again imo. Lads Tylers size dont generally move like he can. I would be shocked if we arnt keeping close tabs on him, good fed trained props are like golddust, if we had 3 of the best young ones, all with natural size and athletic, we'd be in great shape going forward.

Im coming across like his agent, but i do think he's going to be a good prop for a superleague team pretty soon, i hope its us.

Cheers bud. I don't recall him having a poor skill level or anything either, just a big athletic kid who's hard to handle. Agree re. Scurr and English too - the latter does have a really good engine and a little bit of James Graham about him almost.

I see Hird is named in the side for Bradford as per...

Hope you are right and trust that you are. I always liked the look of him too, but don't profess to a shrewd judge of the juniors. Three home made ones and three tough cookies from the NRL would be about right prop wise.

Theres only one James Graham Jimbo. I like Matty English, hes far better than Tyler, but James Graham he aint. Graham was something out of the ordinary.

Liked Tyler he was and is a nice kid, probably too nice on the pitch. A move away was a good thing for him. I doubt Leeds would be looking for him to return going forward

So which of our 4 new signings do you guys expect to make the most different to us this year?

Would have to go with sezer

I hope I am too, seems a good character aswel as a good player.

Its up to him to keep up his current rate of improvement, Academy rugby to championship young player of the year in one season is a terrific start, he's got the physical traits and explosive plays a lot of SL props havnt got, its all about continuing to round out his game and be consistent with the bread and butter of prop forward play.

Short term Sezer if he stays fit. Long term Bentley.

Bit of a cheat but really hoping that Sezer and Austin make it as a pair. It's been a long time since we've had two fully functioning halves. Desperately hoping Fusitu'a is a hero and not a zero. Still struggling to detect his presence in training clips the club puts out.

You do get the feeling this is quite a gamble by the club re Fusitua. Fingers crossed.

All signings are gambles and may or may not work but Fusitua has a decent strike rate in NRL, it was a position of need and hes probably as big a name as we couldve got. Always a risk, especially with overseas that it wont work out, particularly in pandemic times but only time will tell.

Hopefully all 4 signings work out and move us up a level or 3.

I don't quite get the worries over Fusitu'a not being in pre-season games. Our halfbacks need game time, a winger not so much. I just hope that especially with our new half backs we don't waste his attacking threat by using him as a bettering ram - if he's in the right shape a heck of a lot of our attacking thought has to be about creating space for him.

Couldnt agree more.

It's not practice time which might be the issue but the lad has hardly played for 2 years, and his NRL tryscoring feats were from 2018. That's 3-4 years ago and plenty of stars have lost their shine in the NRL - I think they simply burn them out over there sometimes. You can't just pick the one best season a player has ever had and expect him to replicate that now. He might, and I hope he does, but the odds are against it if you look at the evidence.

The risk is mitigated because the Warriors are subsidising his salary for 2 years (which they are doing for a reason).

We've just come off the back of a season where most of our tries came from our hookers, so we're going to have to completely re-engineer how we play to bring DF into the mix. He's very good in the air and so I hope we can get some good kicks up for him - we've been terrible at that play for years IMO.

I imagine the lack of threat out wide is why we've gone for a completely new halfback pairing.

In terms of Fusitu'a it was more around injuries then COVID than any burnout, although its obviously true he hasn't had much rugby in the last two years. The difference between him and pretty much any winger we've had recently is the potential is there if he's physically fit. If he can get to the sort of shape he has been in previously (and at 27 with no obvious long-term problem that should be quite possible) then its just confidence and match practice. Confidence should come if the team set him up right and aim to get him space - it won't come if we chuck him the ball every time we run out of ideas, like Hurrell.

On the NRL prop availability, I don't think anyone is suggesting we should have signed current Origin players. But there was no reason at all we couldn't have had a similar player to Ava last year and this. Signing King last year showed we wanted a prop, but he was the sort of signing you usually expect at the bottom of SL, not a team wanting to compete for trophies. This year we're banking on a 33-year old bulked up second row in Thompson (who hadn't rattled any cages for years before we signed him) to be one of our front rowers. It all suggests that for whatever reason the management haven't seen prop as big a priority as some of us - I'd suggest the evidence from our play off exits in the last two seasons has been pretty conclusive that when its mattered our prop rotation just hasn't been good enough.

Yep agree with that. Fusitu'a is a big thing and he's also very skilful I think. Not sure he has searing pace but in theory he should be a good signing. Totally agree with comments re. Hurrell. I'm sure David will be used for early carries here and there but I'll be disappointed if we revert to "give it to the big lad" rugby..

King was a project signing which (again) didn't quite work out - I think there is something else there other than just the rugby TBH. He was starting to complain a bit I felt. Ava was the big loss, if we still had him I'd be pretty cocky about this year but it is what it is.

I do agree with Ava. Not a big name but a very solid player.