After the way things have been going I admit I am really excited for the start of the new season more so than I probably have been in at least the last 3 years but after todays announcement I cant help but feel a little bit deflated. I think there are so many questions that need answering that its really hard to know where to start. This is just going to be a general ramble and is going to be all over the place.
I went to the fans forum where it first came up and looking back it seems the club had probably gone quite far down the route of agreeing the partnership by that time. I also got the impression that neither Richard Marshall or Marlon Billy were particularly keen on going down the dual reg route and it felt from what the directors and Craig Poskitt had said it was more them that were pushing for it. I saw someone mention earlier that maybe RM was not happy with the squad that he had inherited but I believe that this is the polar opposite of the truth and he is happier than he thought he might be.
Michael Steele says in his statement that this announcement shows how we will bridge the gap to the teams spending more money than us. Im struggling to get my head around it really and how that is going to happen, Ok if it were a top team I could see how getting first teams coming back from injury or young players could help us on the field, I mean look how well Workington did with the Wigan link up. Its not a top team and no disrespect to Hull KR I really cant think of many of their first team that could come in to the team and have the desired effect that we may be looking for that is unless we brought in say 3 or 4 of them and its pretty unlikely that would happen. Their youth system is pretty much pee poor and I honestly can not see us benefiting from taking many if any of their young lads thinking they will improve our team.
I get the Chester and Gene thing and know Chester especially will try to have Fax's best interests at heart but we would still have to be the first dual reg Championship club not to get abused in this system if it is true what the club have said is going to happen. That is the big question though and will that actually be the case? As much as I get the links to ex players and everything I still harp back to my point above trying to figure out on the field if the link is really going to do us that many favours.
Team morale is a big thing and I doubt our players are in favour of this type of set up and again questions have to be asked how its going to run. I take it KR offer us a player we then say yes or no, if we say no then I guess said player gets offered to Gateshead and they probably say yes. From a purely selfish point of view this could mean one of our young lads misses out on a game because Hull Kr are obviously 'the boss' when it comes to the arrangement. This problem is obviously made worse by the clubs decision not to run a second team which also leads to the questions about the scouting idea that came up.
whilst off the field there will be a joint scouting and talent identification network between schools and amateur clubs in each location with young players given an opportunity to gain a contract at their relevant level.
This I do not get, we scout local schools and clubs in the area for the sole benefit of Hull Kr. Well it cant be for our benefit because these young lads do not have a team to play in so this can only be for the sake of Hull Kr trying to tap in to the obvious talent that is in the area. You only have to look at a couple of the Siddal teams coming through and its plain to see it would take a minor miracle if any of the lads who are good enough to make it at a high level are snapped up by Fax, obviously thats no change from recent years, but how does that change now with the new agreement? Now again I could see how this could benefit us if we had teams for the lads to progress in as we would have the benefit of using the Robins scouting network(not that it appears to be great to be fair) that could save the club money.
Maybe the off field stuff makes it worthwhile and the Robins are running their business a lot better than us and we can learn a lot from them. Is that the case though? I mean on our board we have a few guys running successful businesses and I would think when it comes to running the club they are able to do a pretty good job without any other help(obviously monetary help would be different). Again though there is really no harm in listening to other ideas and we might be able to pick something up.
Additional projects off the field will also see the Robins share successful initiatives for increasing match day attendances, attracting new sponsors and developing departments such as retail, community and stadium management.
Meh not really sure what to say on that quote, its basically a think tank by the sounds of it but I thought we already had something like that going on. Once again though if this will save the club money because Hull KR will let us use some of their facilities or goods that will help in this regard then its all good but I would think its mainly stuff the club already can get its hands on given the nature of the clubs directors or sponsors work.
Ramble just about over and as mentioned I think if it benefits the club then it could be a good and shrewd move and that is really all that any of us want, Im just struggling to get my head around it at the moment. Yes its going to cause a heated debate but as has been said the best thing we can do is to try and get behind the team in what could prove to be an exciting era for the club and I dont think we should let this decision dampen our excitement just yet. It would be a real shame if the club lost fans because of this decision.
