I notice the war chest seems to have gone up again
If we were to sign both BJL & AD, we are looking at a guess of $1-1.1m, this would nearly exhaust our spend, still with one player to get?
https://www.foxsports.com.au/nrl/nr...s/news-story/bae09fa8ea8684d3855c588a2afa689d
Wests Tigers coach Michael Maguire has confirmed captain Moses Mbye has been training in the vacant hooking role as the club continues its push to land a marquee signing.
After starting last season at fullback, Mbye switched to the centres but is now preparing to make the transition to the dummy-half role vacated by Robbie Farah.
On the recruitment front, Maguire is adamant the club must learn from its sins of the past and avoid being panicked into overspending on the open market.
Flush with a $1.3 million cheque book for this season, the Tigers have missed out on Latrell Mitchell and Jai Arrow.
The club has since shifted its attention to BJ Leilua and Adam Doueihi and has come under fire for refusing to budge on offers at the negotiating table.
But premiership-winning coach Maguire is adamant the Tigers must hold their nerve.
“We need to be clear about not making the same mistakes this club’s made in the past,” Maguire said.
“We’re in the process of making major changes but we need to be smart about how we make those changes.
“The position our salary cap is in at the moment, we need to get players’ values spot on.
“We want to give players the best opportunity to build something here at Wests Tigers that hasn’t been here at the club for some time.
“We’ve got a great young squad, now we just need to be patient about making the right decisions around who we bring into the club next.
“We won’t be just spending money for the sake of spending it.
“I’d rather take my time and focus on building the club from the ground up. We’ll be diligent about making the right decisions.”
With Josh Reynolds future uncertain due to an upcoming court matter, Tigers captain Mbye has been reshuffled into training at dummy-half with Billy Walters and rookie Jake Simpkin the Tigers other alternatives.
Jacob Liddle was the player most likely to fill the role before sustaining an ACL injury in August of last year playing against Manly.
So with Liddle and club champion Robbie Farah now out of the equation and Reynolds facing an uncertain future, captain Mbye has been identified as the next man up.