RugbyRebels

Be interesting to see who LI announce as joining. Whilst some of those players will be salary cap casualties they won't all be.

BenHK wrote:

Tigger wrote:Sale
In...
George Ford
Jonny Hill
Tom O’Flaherty

Out
AJ MacGinty
Cameron Neild
Curtis Langdon
JP du Preez
Faf de Klerk
Lood de Jager

Going to miss Curtis Langdon...of all the leavers would keep him.

Rugby paper reporting that Sale are also losing the services of Josh Beaumont and Hammersley - both to retirement apparently. In addition to the mid-season losses of Solomona and Yarde, plus the confirmation that RJ Van Rensburg is also off back to SA, Sale are looking at a very small squad next year.

Axe said last week that there were 8-10 leavers, so this would tally with that.

If true, then I'm praying that Axe is scouring the market for a decent 4/5, 13 and 15. Lot of people to lose all at once.

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Josh Beaumont has stated that he is not retiring...

Tom Wood is retiring, so hopefully Hinkley is offered up a contract after an impressive trial

It depends on how we’re defining ‘cap casualties’. In a lot of cases, they may simply have decided against renewing players contracts. For example, van der Merwe has been fairly anonymous and Dell has never been value for money.

I imagine they’d have liked to have kept Phipps, but he’ll have been one of their top earners and they may not have been able to match offers he’s getting elsewhere.

Individually the decisions seem pretty sound - it’s more the amount of players leaving. 11 out with none joining, seems like a lot of players to lose.

I’ve heard them linked with Ed Scragg, an ex Welsh-U20 lock from Cornish Pirates, but that’s it. I suppose they did sign Gonzalez and Cinti mid-season, so they might view them as ‘new’ signings?

Shamelessly stolen from elsewhere;

So'otala Fa'aso'o (8)
Danilo Fischetti (LH - pretty much confirmed by Crowley)
Josh Caulfield (Lock)
Josh Basham (Flanker)
Api Ratuniyarawa (Lock)
Ed Scragg (Lock)

Yeah, I just had a scan through their fans’ forum. I’d forgotten that they already confirmed Zilocchi a couple of months back too.

Basham would be a good signing. He’s been very good since getting a run of games at Falcons.

Scrumhead wrote:It depends on how we’re defining ‘cap casualties’. In a lot of cases, they may simply have decided against renewing players contracts. For example, van der Merwe has been fairly anonymous and Dell has never been value for money.

I imagine they’d have liked to have kept Phipps, but he’ll have been one of their top earners and they may not have been able to match offers he’s getting elsewhere.

Individually the decisions seem pretty sound - it’s more the amount of players leaving. 11 out with none joining, seems like a lot of players to lose.

I’ve heard them linked with Ed Scragg, an ex Welsh-U20 lock from Cornish Pirates, but that’s it. I suppose they did sign Gonzalez and Cinti mid-season, so they might view them as ‘new’ signings?

Agreed - most of those names that're being released, I'm looking at and going, "Fair, I wouldn't've kept them either." Phipps is the exception as he has been (surprisingly) good, but that might be a salary cap one, especially if they're planning on putting their faith in White.

Puja

Scrumhead wrote:Yeah, I just had a scan through their fans’ forum. I’d forgotten that they already confirmed Zilocchi a couple of months back too.

Basham would be a good signing. He’s been very good since getting a run of games at Falcons.

Yeah Basham has come on well with Falcons recently. Good pick up.

Looking at those rumoured signings it looks pretty heavy duty forward reinforcements.

So'otala Fa'aso'o (8) - 6ft5 21 stone
Josh Basham (Flanker) - 6ft4 nearly 17 stone
Api Ratuniyarawa (Lock) - 6ft6 18 stone
Ed Scragg (Lock) - 6ft7 19 stone

LI needed some more cost effective forward power and that looks like what they've got. Spending big on Mafi and SOB didn't quite work out for them.