Kieron Purtill backing Hull FC to get long-term goals right as he explains strides made

Hull FC assistant coach Kieron Purtill is fully on board with the clubs youth direction. It’s that development that they see as vital to future sustainability, and it’s a vision that everyone is buying into.

After all, only four clubs have won Super League since it’s inception in 1996 and there’s a common denominator about all four: youth. Each winner has had a strong core of homegrown players mixed with quality recruitment and stars from overseas. The recipe is there to see.

Hull are trying to mix all the ingredients now, giving minutes to Matty Laidlaw and Charlie Severs in recent weeks with Denive Balmforth also debuting this year. That, added with the recent training ground announcements at the University of Hull, is the long game, and the Black and Whites are willing to play it.

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“It’s always good to get your homegrown players through,” Purtill explained. “It’s something the club has been making a point about with the junior set ups and pathways.

“You have to give them a platform and they’re starting to come through now. They’re not the finished article and they’re not where they need to be yet, but we’re making strides in that area.

“Ideally we’d like to turning out a full thirteen of homegrown players. That’s the aim and the ideal situation. I don’t think there’s many clubs who get a full seventeen. They always sprinkle that with some quality whether that’s from Super League or overseas but eventually we’d like to get to the point where we’re turning out our starting thirteen of players that have come through our system.”

That’s a big dream, but Purtill has witnessed the growth of these departments first hand having arrived from