Signed for Hull KR from your scholarship side. England youth international I believe. Have any of you guys seen him play or know much about him?

Jesus H Christ - another one bites the dust; Shudds have recently made off with a couple and now HKR take their pick.

It could be time for the club to explain what the hell is going in with the 1873 project; shouldn't that be generating sufficient funds to stop this from happening?

Precisely - beginning to wander what the point of it is!

Like I keep harpin on,parent pressure,loyalty,silly money,who knows but definately not the lack of trying to keep them by Wakey.

It does it really does so please if you are - keep donating.

As BLM says it's not through a lack of trying. The problem as I see it is that heads are easily turned especially those of some parents - some of whom have no real knowledge of or interest in the game.

Sadly when it comes to head turning we struggle - recent very poor form - the endless debate regarding NM whilst other clubs forge ahead - prehistoric facilities, worse than most of the amateur clubs these kids come from! - a very conveniently located club that other clubs like to shop at.

We do keep a few good ones and occasionally pinch a few (which folk seem to forget) - and there is no reason to suspect any of the recent losses are in anyway certain future SL players.

It is irksome but without the 1873 project we'd probably have nothing. As it is a few of the Under 17's and under 19's look to have some potential. Also as you know you simply can't keep them all.

Will Oakes left 5 months ago, this is old news.

HKR offered him a 1st team Super League contract which quite frankly is ridiculous.
He's nowhere near ready for training with 1st team players, he has so much physical development to go through before he mixes it at training with fully grown blokes. He's a good prospect for a 16 year old but still needs to be with 16,17 & 18 year olds while he's learning the game and developing physically.

Wakefield did all that they could to keep him but he was head hunted by a number of clubs while also letting it be known that he wanted away for whatever reason.

The only other to be 'lost' was Will Ingleby, a half back who went to Huddersfield.

Vasty is correct when he says that facilities are probably the biggest issue when it comes to attracting and retaining talent from the Youth set up. Most of the clubs have state of the art training centres that are built specifically to create the physique required for the modern game.
Prehab and rehab centres with pressure chambers, dedicated medical facilities, video analysis suites, a team of professional Coaches and highly qualified Strength & Conditioning Staff.

When kids go to school or back to their Community clubs they talk to each other, how do the Wakey Academy lads feel when they listen to their mates wax lyrically about the superb training environment, state of the art, modern & scientific equipment they have available to them.

At those pivotal points when many clubs are romancing the same group of players with mums and dads in tow, they have their heads turned by the investments that Wigan, Warrington, Leeds, Huddersfield and the Hull clubs have made in their training centres.
Wakefield and Castleford in particular pale in comparison!

We can only dream of competing with that at the moment but it's what makes Club 1873 so vital to Wakefield and it's another reason why the new stadium is a must!

It will be the same until we get stadium/facilities sorted, we are rebuilding the club and Wakefield will always produce RL players and hopefully we will start keeping the best ones like we're starting to already. Huddersfield have been after the Wakefield youngsters for the last few years because they can't produce enough of their own.

He's joined the new joint Hull/Rovers academy

On a Full Time Super League 1st Team contract which will mean he at least starts the year training with their 1st team. I say "starts" because I have some faith that common sense will prevail and they'll step him down to Academy U19s training rather than over challenging him against fully developed adults who's technical ability is way beyond Wills.

Thought the idea of a shared FC/Rovers Academy was to improve the prospects of the Hull area. Is this lad originally from Humberside?

That would be narrow minded to think every lad that will come through the academy will be from east yorkshire that just won't happen,

And the article in the HDM says oaks has been given a 1st te contract but won't be seen in the 1st team he will go straight into the new joint academy

I got it from the the horses mouth ,a super league coach in Humberside,you guess which one,that the joint venture will never work.The dominating past amateur teams don't exist at the present in Hull so looking further afield may be there only option at the moment.When he's been messed about for a while hopefully he'll come back to Wakey.