‘He could have been the future': Wests Tigers torched after yet another young gun eyes exit
Fox League's James Hooper reported on Wednesday night that Silva is a chance of being released from the club before the June 30 deadline, having met with three rival NRL coaches.
Todd Payten, Jason Ryles, Anthony Seibold have already sat down with da Silva while the Tigers hooker is set to meet Newcastle coach Adam O'Brien on Saturday.
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Hooper described it as an 'absolute kick in the guts' for the Tigers considering the big-name juniors the club has failed to keep, headlined by James Tedesco, Mitchell Moses, Aaron Woods, Ryan Papenhuyzen, Josh Addo-Carr and, more recently, Lachlan Galvin.
The Daily Telegraph's David Riccio, meanwhile, said da Silva 'could have been the future of the Wests Tigers'.
But NRL 360 co-host Braith Anasta pushed back on the idea the Tigers could have done much more to keep da Silva while even Hooper conceded the development exposed the 'tough' reality for some of the league's struggling clubs.
'There's been so many false dawns at that club over the course of the last decade, off the back of three wooden spoons,' Hooper said.
'The local juniors are something that, they give you a bit of hope and they give you a bit of belief. You look at the stronger clubs, the Panthers are the best example, they've got the biggest junior nursery. They hum off the back of that procession line.
'For the Tigers to just continually get beat to the punch in that respect, it's a tough pill to swallow.
'... I'll tell you what's really tough. If you look at the Storm when they had Cameron Smith and Harry Grant. They found a way to make that work.
'You see it at the stronger clubs at this point in time with the way the competition's set up, the teams that are down the bottom are just getting bent over all the time. They just get cherry-picked with all of their top talent.'
While Anasta said it was far from a 'simple call' for the Tigers given da Silva didn't want to stick around for another year playing under Koroisau, he did add that using Melbourne as a comparison, younger players are happy to stick around sometimes at the NRL's powerhouse clubs.
To prove his point, Anasta used one of his clients, Jonah Pezet, as an example.
'He's happy to stay there, do his apprenticeship, play under the players. He would have been playing first grade at any other club a year or two ago, but he sits back,' Anasta said.
Da Silva is signed until the end of 2026 but has been granted permission to talk with rival clubs, with Tigers coach Benji Marshall recently admitting he was 'not sure' if the hooker would leave Concord before the June 30 transfer deadline.
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