I’d be surprised and underwhelmed if the club is going with Trueman & Abdul as the starting halfback pairing for 2025. Not because of any lack in ability as they do have the ability it’s simply due to the fitness records. The odds of them playing 50% of games together must be pretty high based on their injury records.
I’d hope that we are still looking at a 7 to replace the loss of Clifford and what he brought as a quality 7 and to help further the development of Charles.
As has already been mentioned we have a very very slow team that seriously lacks pace and I hope this area is going to be addressed.
I appreciate the level of rebuild in immense and on a scale I’ve not seen before but solid players are ok but only if combined with some real quality otherwise.
It’s early days yet so hoping things will improve quality wise in terms of signings particularly since the announcement of Cartwright for 2025, but there’s a long long way to go such has been our demise the past few seasons and the recruitment mess. There’s still Okunbor and Pele to decide on with both shipped out on loan which just shows how farcical the recruitment has been when we are desperate for players yet 2 quota players are shipped out on loan.
I don’t expect us to suddenly become world beaters overnight but the club needs to make some serious signings for next season otherwise it’s likely there'll be little in the way of pass holders. We all know that’s going to be difficult due to our own doings and failures along with an ever shrinking player pool. Hopefully Cartwrights knowledge of the NRL and reserve grade and his standing in the game will allow us to take full advantage of the relaxation of the rules for quality players that wouldn’t have met the appearance requirements previously needed.
