Test of Depth at Manly

[Ryan]

They say that a test of depth at a club, is by how many players you have in your team that have only tasted 1st grade at one club - i.e. local juniors, or players bought at a junior level, and have come through the ranks. Therefore, I thought I'd test this theory out on Manly versus St George. I know I do this quite a lot, but I do so to highlight in my opinion, where I think OUR club (not Steve Roaches) can improve. I will list the players from both teams that would have only played at one club. I am including Northern Eagles as manly, and Illawarra as St George:-

1. Ben Hornby
2. Wes Naiqama
3. Mark Gasnier
4. Matt Cooper
5.
6. Trent Barrett
7. Mathew Head
8. Luke Bailey
9.
10. Jason Ryles
11. Dean Young
12. Lance Thompson
13. Shaun Timmins

14. Aaron Gorrell
15. Michael Henderson
16. Ashton Sims
17. Justin Poore

Ok - so they've had TWO players that have not come through the junior ranks. Now manly:-

01. Brett Stewart
02. Paul Stephenson
03. Steve Matai
04.
05.
06.
07.
08.
09. Chad Randall
10. Jason King
11. Anthony Watmough
12. Steve Menzies
13.

14.
15.
16.
17.

Interesting eh? There's no point in pointing out an obvious criticism without having an idea or reason why we should be able to fix it.

I'd like to point you all to the arive alive cup site, and suggest you look at all the schools registered in it. Nothing at all close to The Northern Beaches !!! I'd say we need a much healthier start there. Right at the grass roots. Players like Barrett, Fittler, Marshall etc etc have come out of this.

I'd also like to say that Zorba - you are not above us!! If you receive a request to phone one of us, make the call. You have lost two talented players that Beatson snapped up, AFTER we were going to get you to them first.

And this has happenned many times. It's these grass roots players that will make us strong again.

I won't even go into the debacle of someone trying to get in through the Jersey Flegg trials, and was not even contacted back.....

Manly management - all of you should wake up to yourselves !!!

 

[Garts]

Put Greenshields in there as well.

Interesting comparison, however the Dragons do have a much bigger junior area so I would expect them to have a greater no of local juniors.

this is why the club needs to look outside our area for young players, but why not listen to fans trying to help the club out with talent spotting? I dont understand it. Do people think the club would receive a high number of calls informing them of talented kids that are just not up to the required level so they ignore most of these calls now?

 

[SilentBob]

How is this a test of depth? It shows that St Illawarra have a good junior system (having Wollongong + the rest helps). I understand the point about depth, or lack of it, but I don't know how this proves it. You should use the top 25-30 players if you're go to do this type of comparison, not the origins of players. Just to prove my point...

1. Matthew Ridge
2. Danny Moore
3. Craig Innes
4. Terry Hill
5. John Hopoate
6. Nik Kosef
7. Geoff Toovey
8. David Gillespie
9. Jim Serdaris
10. Mark Carroll
11. Steve Menzies
12. Daniel Gartner
13. Owen Cunningham

14. Cliff Lyons
15. Des Hasler
16. Neil Tierney
17. Craig Hancock

Looking at this 1996 Manly premiership winning side and going by what "they" say about testing depth, I'd say the depth isn't much better than the 2005 side. :~?

For as long as I have supported Manly, they have always had a healthy amount of purchased players in their side. Manly never has, and probably never will have the constant stream of juniors coming through that St Illawarra, Parra, Dogs etc have. The only way to compete with this kind of junior representation is to take the Roosters approach and offer 16 year olds $80k for their loyalty, something the club isn't in a position to do. The junior ranks are slowly building with Noel Cleal doing his job, the SG Ball side is proof of that, a few of those guys will make it, and they will be playing with a bunch of players bought by the club, that's been the winning formula for Manly for longer than I've been alive, blame demographics if you want to blame anything.

I'm sure there are things the club can do better when it comes to juniors and so on going by the other thread, having personally dealt with Parra and Canberra coming through the junior ranks, they also have failings, so it's not just a Manly thing.

 

[byso]

Well maybe Manly should consider investing more money and coaching into the local Juniors rather than trying to Flogg off our PL side to Asquith Magpies

Our Junior league is vitually a joke the A-grade comp is struggles to get enough teams on the paddock each year.

 

[Spuds Bodyguard]

As alluded to by SilentBob The North Shore / Northern Beaches is a predominantly Rugby Union Area. No other NRL side has near the competition from other sports.

The northern beaches sustains 2 successful Union clubs each with 6 grades + juniors.

That is not going to change any time soon. :bdh:

 

[lukesweeneyisok]

Well maybe Manly should consider investing more money and coaching into the local Juniors rather than trying to Flogg off our PL side to Asquith Magpies

Our Junior league is vitually a joke the A-grade comp is struggles to get enough teams on the paddock each year.

What's happening between Manly and Asquith?

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

Interesting way to test depth,but tbh I don;t buy into it at all really.

Parramatta have pretty good depth, are always in the loop in the lower grades, yet their top side is full of guys from elsewhere eg McKinnon,Grothe,Tahu,Morris,Riddell,Morrison, Stringer

 

[Matabele]

We will never get a side like 95-97 with the local junior representations for one simple reason:

Rugby Union.

In short, Zorba had better be taught how to return phone calls.

 

[Ryan]

Why would hee care? Just like Blockhead - my opinion is they think it is more about them than the team & us fans.

 

[danno]

They say that a test of depth at a club, is by how many players you have in your team that have only tasted 1st grade at one club - i.e. local juniors, or players bought at a junior level, and have come through the ranks.

I gather "they" is Ryan.

A better test of depth is how many first graders you have bought from other clubs that have to play reserve grade e.g. Ray Brown.

 

[Ryan]

How many 1st graders at other clubs are in our premier league team? Anyone know?