Was thinking about this earlier today, rather than working: we have had a relatively crap reserve-grade side for a number of years now, which is partly due to the limited talent pool in our area...but must also in part be due to the fact that we've had such a stable squad of high-performing first-graders for so long now.
Looking at the talent that is going to be sitting in reserve grade next season if we recruit like it looks we will (i.e. get one more prop such as Moa, possibly another half) then you can;t blame people for not wanting to come here over the past eight years or so. "Head to Brooky, watch our kick-ass first grade team in action after your NSW Cup Game" - not much appeal there.
So we'll possibly have Sao, Symonds, Leary, Demetriou, Chee Kam(?), Lawrence, Starling etc missing out week to week. An unusual position for us to be in! Good in the short term, but most of them will move on to keep playing the first grade they are capable of, you'd have to think.
Looking at the talent that is going to be sitting in reserve grade next season if we recruit like it looks we will (i.e. get one more prop such as Moa, possibly another half) then you can;t blame people for not wanting to come here over the past eight years or so. "Head to Brooky, watch our kick-ass first grade team in action after your NSW Cup Game" - not much appeal there.
So we'll possibly have Sao, Symonds, Leary, Demetriou, Chee Kam(?), Lawrence, Starling etc missing out week to week. An unusual position for us to be in! Good in the short term, but most of them will move on to keep playing the first grade they are capable of, you'd have to think.