. He's what, third choice? Decent squad player who was needed at short notice with probably not a lot of options. Not as good as Bateman, but we have plenty of good props, we don't need to spend the entire cap on the front row, it isn't 2003 any more. Same could be said about Mamukashvili, not as talented a player as Polota-Nau, but I'd rather spend the cap elsewhere. Neither signing was supposed to be an improvement, it was about balancing the squad and, for example, being able to afford a back row that can actually compete in the Premiership.Similar kind of situation with 11, 13, 14, 15 - are Moroni, Van Wyk, Nadolo and Murimurivalu better than Tuilagi, May, Holmes and Veainu? Maybe, maybe not, but I suspect they are cheaper and will be available for a lot more matches. There's a reason that Chiefs only started signing 6N internationals in recent years - there's no point having them unless you can get to the playoffs without them. It was insane to have so many England internationals when we were struggling in the bottom of the table.
Kalamafoni is a very good player, but he's not as explosive as Wiese or Liebenberg. Different kind of player, and we needed the latter.
It doesn't really matter whether the new individuals are better than those they replaced, this is a team sport and our team is now better balanced than it was before - that's what is important. For too long there was too much focus on the front row and England internationals, at the expense of the back row and squad depth. Of course it helps massively that the academy appears to have come good, but all in all I would say our recruitment has been good.
