Clarkson is definately 1st team material IMO, proven by the fact he kept his place in the 17 when Ablett, JJB & Lauiti'iti were all available

There's still the likes of Clarkson,Burgess,Watkins and Bjb that are around and imo will make the step up.

Plus we've also handed opportunities to the likes of Gibson ,Scruton,Ratu and Worrall who have all moved on.

I don't think it's as bad as you claim mate of course it would be nice to have 1-13 of homegrown quality players but i doubt that will ever happen and we still have a core of very good acadamy products within our 1st team squad.

If my calculations are correct, in 5 years leeds will fail to qualify for the playoffs. We'll win one more grand final between now and then.



Sinfield and mcguire are irreplaceable and when they retire or leave we'll go downhill rapidly.

how the hell can you calculate a thing like that?

Sorry but that's ridiculous.....in 5 years anything could happen with regards to a new kid somewhere coming through.

By heck, you may all mock but he's right you know, see - 6.02 x 10 to the power 23 = finishing 9th in 2015

With the signings of Ambler, Pitts and Amor I thought Leeds (and Bluey in particular) were saying that the junior forwards coming through weren't up to it? Hardly a ringing endorsement of the state of junior development at the club.



Junior development shouldn't be treated as a tap that can be turned on when required. Just because we have McGuire and Burrow for example doesn't mean we should stop looking for the next big thing at halfback. All players are one injury away from the end of their career. I also don't buy the idea that you can have too many good juniors.



TBH this whole area is one of the key reasons we're way behind the Aussies. Every year every NRL club will have 2 or 3 juniors coming through who are capable of making first grade on a regular basis (not all world beaters but good players). This is one of the factors enables them to survive the fact that so many NRL regulars end up in England.

But there are far fewer juniors over here in comparison to Australia so fewer will come through.



I've said it before and I'll say it again. Even with the best academy set up the most 1st teamers a club can hope to expect to get from the academy each year is one or two. Any more is a once in a decade or more occurance. Leeds glut of kids comign through in 2001/3 was a golden generation for you guys. Now other clubs are switched on in junior development it'll be much harder to get those numbers.

It will certainly make it harder to attract juniors from outside the immediate catchment/Service Area due to increased competition.



Of that golden generation you mentioned however, the majority are from within the Leeds Service Area. Maybe the amateur clubs in Leeds just aren't finding/producing kids of a required standard to feed up through the Service Area route and into the junior age groups?

thats what people need to understand, the 2001 generation was a freak and we should be compared to that generation. Also there simply isnt the opportunity to blood all those players at once like we did back then, mainly because we didnt win anything during the 'blooding' years, and we werent particularly good for a while whilst those youngsters got up to speed. There is no real point in us not aiming for success now with a team proven to be able to do it in favour of aiming for it in 3 years with players who have yet to prove their quality.



2001 generation was the building of the foundations, now we dont need to build those foundations, they are already there, if we can bring through 2 or 3 top class players every 2 or 3 years then we will be doing fine, and thats what we seem to be doing with Hall Ablett Burgess and Smith, now we are bringing through Clarkson, Watkins and BJB, and adding young british players when we need like Pitts and Ambler etc. This is exactly what we should be doing, what all clubs should be doing.

Diskin, Sinfield and Burrow aren't.

More clubs are pulling out the stops to attract the top young players now. Whereas 10 years ago there will have been only a couple of clubs switched on nowadays rule changes like the home grown rule means that clubs have to look at junior recruitment and I doubt any club is going to be able to stockpile the best young players.



To give an idea of the level of competition the Bulls recently signed a highly rated young backrower from Dudley Hill. A certain club over the hill were offering a 10k signing on fee & car on top of a lucrative contract. All the other SL clubs were interested too. It just shows how much clubs attention has turned to junior development.



I think the days of "golden generations" are going to be rarer and rarer.