fevnut's musings 2019: #3: Reality check and Player Turnover

fevnut's musings

The Reality

It never ceases to amuse us when Fev fans make pronouncements without any regard to the reality of the situation. That is particularly pertinent to the reaction of some of them after the match last Sunday against Hunslet Club Parkside.

Both at the ground itself and on social media there were people spreading doom and gloom with one in particular suggesting that we were bound to be relegated at the end of the 2019 season.

When we arrived at the ground we got hold of the team-sheets for the match and after a quick glance said to a friend that we were very unlikely to win. So let’s look at the teams that played.

For Fev there were only two players (John Davies and Josh Hardcastle) who are likely to figure regularly in the first team and they only played in the first half. Most of the team were made up of the players who had been signed or were on trial for the new reserve team. This was the first time they had played in a match together and it was the beginning of them getting to know one another.

In contrast, the Hunslet Club Parkside team were a cohesive outfit who last year had taken the top division of the National Conference League by storm winning every single league match and then sailing through to earn victory in the Grand Final. An outcome that had never been achieved before. Peter Smith, the well-respected rugby league journalist of the Yorkshire Post, said that they “got what they deserved at the end of possibly the greatest season in amateur rugby league history.”

There are some journalists who say things to be deliberately controversial and others who think carefully about what they write. Peter Smith is definitely one of the latter.

The fact that Hunslet Club Parkside won cannot be seen as being in any way surprising and is absolutely not a result which should make Rovers supporters in the slightest bit despondent.

Indeed, we thought that there was something really heartening and that was the display of young fullback Kiedan Hartley. He is still very young with a huge amount to learn but he showed huge talent and his try was a joy to behold.

Championship Comings and Goings

As we have stated before, good teams need to be built into a group of players whose ability to play together makes them much greater than the individuals who make up the team. We believe that Fev’s greatest team ever was the one that finished top of the Rugby League table in the 1976/77 season. On the three occasions we won the Challenge Cup we took the trophy by winning 5 matches. When we finished at the top of the league it was in a 30 match league season and we finished 5 points clear and also had the best points difference.

In the whole of that season there were only 3 players who made their débuts for the first team. They were Steve Evans, John Gilbert and David Vickers. All three of them had come through the ‘A’ team and knew their first team colleagues really well before they got their first team opportunity.

Nowadays it would seem that the mind-set of club owners, administrators and coaches is to make wholesale changes in the squad every year, never allowing a team to build. In the last 4 years an unbelievable 73 players have made their Rovers débuts.

Year	Making Débuts	Dual Reg	Loan Signings
2015	25	5	1
2016	18	7	4
2017	13	7	2
2018	17	8	6

But it’s not just Fev! Over the close season we have kept a careful eye out for each club’s announcements of signings. This is what we have found.

Club	Signings for 2019
Barrow Raiders	8
Batley Bulldogs	9
Bradford Bulls	7
Dewsbury Rams	18
Featherstone Rovers	15
Halifax	6
Leigh Centurions	17
Rochdale Hornets	15
Sheffield Eagles	14
Swinton Lions	14
Toronto Wolfpack	6
Toulouse Olympique	8
Widnes Vikings	6
York City Knights	11
TOTAL	154

That’s an average of 11 per club and that’s before we get to dual reg and loan signings during the season.

In October we will, as usual, be making a Christmas cake. Each year we make a wish whilst stirring in the ingredients. This year our wish will be that most of the players who make their débuts in 2020 will be youngsters coming up from the reserves. Players who will already know how to play with the more established members of the team.