You wonder how the side would be travelling if the club had kept players they had released (or were unable to keep) since 2003 and had released the players kept.
A pretty good side of rejects: Turner, Pommeroy, Stapo, Rossy, Swain, Big Joe, Franze, Crossman, Campbell...there must be more.
And then had snared Lyon and Wing instead of losing them in negotiations at the last minute.
Theoretically, you could have got Jeremy Smith for a half early last year to (try to) compensate for Gower, a Walker lad maybe (they are always on the market!).
Inject Jennings, Wallace and Daniella and who knows?
Still the underlying idea behind Elliot is to stop this brain-drain from occurring (and attract the leagues brightest) I suppose.
I wonder how that collateral ambition to winning games is going. I havent heard of a mass walk out or anything like that.
Now back to Elliot and the forensics of getting the team to perform.
His challenge is to get the players ready to compete for every match. Thats his job.
He has know how to motivate each one of them and lift them to their best.
If his current techniques are failing, he needs to find new ones, or people to help him.
Brisbane have scientific staff to lift their players mentally, Souths now have access to shrinks too.