Absolutely gutted from a playing perspective - in our top 3 players IMO along with Sika and Kelly and brought some irreplaceable skill to the table. Great hands, great feet, superb player. Incredibly disappointing.
As others have said though, it appears that he's got disciplinary form off the field and if you're trying to build a culture you have to put a marker down, you can't let individuals take the pis$. The Lineham/Westerman precedent is very relevant here - Watts a similar character just, IMO, with greater potential. Have to trust the club but unless we can replace with quality, which we all know is extremely scarce, particularly mid season, it definitely reduces our chances of on-field success this year. With a host of other players OOC this year such as Kelly, Mini, Manu, Carlos, Green, there's the nagging doubt that we'll see a repeat of our experiences after success in 1991 and 2005 where key players weren't adequately replaced. We have a strong pipeline at least but I'd have thought Watts was a player for us to build a team around, hence Powell and co biting our hand off.
