Recruitment And Retention Discussion

Newygirl said:
Brown is a big part of the reason KP re-signed and while Smith has been a great fill in, he’s definitely not a Dylan Brown level talent as good as he’s been.

The problem is we didn’t actually get very much of Brown, KP and Sharpe because of them all being injured. Look forward to seeing it one day hopefully before KP retires, they can string a full season together
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Ill be happy with 15+ games plus a finals series with all of em. And our starting front row for the finals
 
No argument at all with Brown. He is a very good player, one of the first picked in the NZ test side. We may have paid slight overs for him now, but once the cap goes up he will be at a good price. Agree with HVG we don’t win a comp without him.
 
luke46 said:
Hmm.. maybe. The jury is still out on the Dylan brown contract for mine. Do we look markedly worst with 6. Sharpe 7. Smith? Arthur signing didn’t work out. Etc.
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In defense we look markedly worse and that is 50% of the game. In saying that Smith has been fantastic for us and is young enough to improve that side of his game. With the high attrition rate in the modern game, he will always see plenty of NRL and continue to be a crucial cog.
 
slotmachine said:
Defence yes, we don't go backwards too much with Sandon in attack
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I think it's a lot easier for Brown to generate space on his outside and the bigger the game the more that he can basically be an extra forward in yardage will make a difference. I think we need Dylan's defence and will also need him to break down the best defenses.

In a general sense though yes as a guy who's got some pace & skill about him he's been perfectly capable of doing the same role in the attacking system.
 
For me there's not much in it. Yeah brown is better at taking hit ups, digging into the line and long kicking. Reckon Sandon has a stronger short kicking game and is a better pure ballplayer.
 
slotmachine said:
For me there's not much in it. Yeah brown is better at taking hit ups, digging into the line and long kicking. Reckon Sandon has a stronger short kicking game and is a better pure ballplayer.
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Disagree there, I think Dylan is a better at every aspect of the sport, including short kicking game but to me he’s ball-playing is significantly better. We just haven’t had a chance to see it all in a Knights jersey yet.

Probably hasn’t helped he’s always played on the left and has had to get used to the right side. Would still like to see him play left side just to see it


 
Worth noting that Dylan was playing with one knee held together by wishes and prayers all season, and my understanding is when playing with a partially torn ACL you have this extra weekly rehab load which I believe will be gone once he returns. This season was the first full season he played where he wasn't in the top 5 for line breaks by halves I believe. We haven't seen the best of him yet. The main thing we've seen is that getting him on the first layer of the attack to open up the field for others a la Izzy Katoa may genuinely be where the best version of him will blossom.

I think Sandon has been a fair bit better with his short kicking game, especially with the creativity of it - Dylan can default to what you might call a bit of a robotic option. Otherwise I think Dylan's better at everything else, especially decision-making/calmness after a line break.
 
It will be fine. It won't be possible to keep everyone whether or not we have Niukore on the books, and POS isn't dumb enough to let Fletcher & Hopwood walk, + I think Phoenix has made himself indispensable and will be extended too. Buckley's chance of keeping both Francis & Jermaine either way so just enjoy having both while we do.
 
You're kidding if you don't think having an extra 600k lying around won't make a difference in 2028.

What's more concerning to me is that based on the last fortnight Niukore doesn't make it on the field when everyone is fit next year. If we say Jsaf, Mooney and Lucas are locked on starters Niukore is behind Crokes, McEwen, Francis, Crouch and Hopwood.
 
The Artist Formerly Known as Aku'd said:
I read somewhere else that it’s a foregone conclusion that Manuleleua won’t re-sign. Can’t recall whether that is cap pressure or just it being accepted he may prefer to go somewhere closer to home.
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I don't know why Francis would leave.
Holbrook has worked wonders with both Marzhew and Francis.
His style of training, based largely on football drills, really suits those guys.
Francis has always been a genetic freak with natural skills, but he failed at the Warriors and Penrith and was failing at the Knights because he just wasn't nearly fit enough.
I think Francis would be taking a massive gamble if he went away from whatever is working for him right now.
All last year he had highlight reel moments that made you think he could be anything, but for most of the time he was struggling to get back in line and missing tackles because he was gassed.
 
slotmachine said:
You're kidding if you don't think having an extra 600k lying around won't make a difference in 2028.

What's more concerning to me is that based on the last fortnight Niukore doesn't make it on the field when everyone is fit next year. If we say Jsaf, Mooney and Lucas are locked on starters Niukore is behind Crokes, McEwen, Francis, Crouch and Hopwood.
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I’ve had a few concerns that when fully fit - we have a few in the team playing a prelim final and a bunch of games this season - that may find themselves in Cup most weeks next year - who knows it they’ll be happy with that.

But you know what, I think that’s absolutely best case scenario and great. It means our FG team is full strength with minimal injuries. If we somehow jag a season with such talent being forced into Cup - we have superb depth and should be shooting for the premiership.

Brown will be out for a fair chunk and I don’t think we should rush him back - we have him for another 7 years minimum - if we break him, we have to deal with the consequences. High ACL re rupture rate first year back. So I can see Smith maintaining his role for majority of 2027 - but I’m curious what he’s going to want to do in 2028 if he’s proving himself as a good starting 7.

The forwards is now, suddenly an interesting proposition. At the start of this year we were all calling out for another prop to be competitive. Fast forward to near the end and we are saying we have too many options to fit into the matchday squad. I still think our play style has masked our forward issues. We aren’t asking Hopwood/Crouch to take lots of hit ups to get us out of trouble. We kind of keep our forwards fresh and ask them to contribute defensively. But if Safs and Mooney are fit - our pack looks a lot better.

This is where Holbrooks man management will be tested. Bound to get some injuries. Which will work themselves out. But maybe we have a luxury of rotating some of them. He’s going to have some interesting decisions on his mind - what to do with Lucas, McEwen and Manu. What to do at Centre. What to do with forward rotation.

As I said before, I’m not discounting Niukore until I see him train and play some games for us. Maybe he will come in and demand a spot with his performances.

In terms of money, his 600k isn’t as horrible as it sounds. If we don’t have him, we need somebody else. So unless we are paying somebody minimum wage for a top 30 spot - which I can’t really see happening - we are maybe looking at 300k for a fringe first grader or depth. Which gives us 300k to play with - which equates to about $190k effective.

I cant fault the club for identifying our lack of prop depth at the start of the season and trying to address it. I don’t think we could foresee how much some of these guys would improve and thrive.

I think we see a bit of movement over the next few years. We can’t keep everyone happy both financially and with gametime. But in our favour, we look like we are going to be a competitive team. We are a little used to potentially having to pay overs for players to come here because we haven’t had a lot of success. But now, we may finally be able to capitalise on having a good coach, a competitive squad and some really good players and have players actually want in.

A good example is the Best situation. Obviously we don’t know the details. But let’s say he’s got the option to stay here for 750K (400 post tax) and be part of this success, he’s been here for a long time, he’s settled and now gets the rewards of winning and even in the window for origin. Or move to Eels for $1M (530k post) where they are not likely to be challenging top 4 and maybe scraping the 8 if they have a good year. So he’s got to decide if $130k is worth giving up what he has here. That’s where hopefully our success/coach/potential window can help us out a bit.
 
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