Woolf Q&A on James Roby, Joey Lussick and Morgan Knowles

MC: How will Joey Lussick complement the team next year?

KW: We know that we need to build our depth around the halves/hooker area. He really caught the attention for Salford and was always a player we made a mention of on a tip sheet.

This year, with him moving back to the NRL, he is a guy that in the NSW Cup and in his NRL appearances he is a guy we have kept a bit of an eye on.

He has got a lot to his game as a hooker; he has a good service both short and long.

He is a very good defender and a real competitor who likes to play tough and compete hard and do all the hard work.

He has a kicking game, which is important because we can see the value of Robes’ kicking game at the moment.

But he has not lost his ability to run and knows how to find the tryline – we think he has a lot of things that will complement how we want to play and what we need in that position.

MC: How will it work with James Roby still here next year?

KW: Joey has also got some real versatility; his main position is 9 but he can play 13 and at different times last year adjusted into the halves at six or seven with Salford having done that really well as a junior.

We know that Robes has said next year will be his last. We needed to make sure we were building some depth in those positions when Robes moves on.

It puts us in a strong position there – we have real class players in the 1,6,7, 9 and 13 positions but we have some class in our depth and a progression going forward post-Robes.

MC: A lot of coaches have contemplated Saints life after James Roby/Keiron Cunningham era, but it appears to now finally falling on your watch. What do you expect of Robes next year?

KW: Robes is outstanding and can still sit out there and play 80 minutes if we asked him to and he would be happy to do that and would do it really well.

In the big games that is what we have asked him to do and he hasn’t flinched and has been one of our best and most consistent.

The fact is we need to transition for the benefit of the club and make sure that next year we are looking after Robes a little bit and not expecting quite as much as we have this year and last.

That is part of the transition – we are not going to move away from him straight away. He has shown this year how influential he is and what an impact he has for us.

That will continue next year and I have no doubt he will have his hand up to play every week and will still have a big influence on the big games next year.

MC: Talking of leaders Morgan Knowles has really been stepping up his contribution?

KW: Morgan is an exceptional player; a combination of being tough and physical with a skillset of a traditional loose forward.

We are better when he is in the team - and a better attacking team too. He is certainly developing as a player as we would like him to – and is already an international standard player and one of the best in the competition. With his age and the way he is heading he is going to get better.

MC: Does it help make the case for a traditional 13 when you have the personnel with that complete loose forward package rather than simply using another big ball carrier?

KW: It does and it really helps our attack. We are well off there and have guys like Jake Wingfield coming through as well. We certainly promote and want to develop our young forwards to pass a ball and play off them.

To answer, yes, it does help when you have got the personnel. If you look at the game in Australia as well as here, everyone would like to have that middle forward that is tough enough to play in the middle and work hard enough to do the defence in there but also have the skillset to play off.

The fact of the matter is that there are not a lot of the really good ones around – but we are very blessed that Morgan Knowles is one of the good ones.